Ottobre, 2021

Play Pass launched two years ago to offer a new way to experience Google Play. Subscribers have enjoyed all-you-can-play access to hundreds of games and apps, completely free of ads or in-app purchases, with new titles added monthly. And we’ve been pretty busy since then. Play Pass is now available in 90+ countries and after launching with 350+ titles, we’ve added nearly 600 more to make your subscription even better with new content to discover every month. This includes 100+ teacher-approved titles, giving parents and kids access to great games and learning apps completely free of ads or in-app purchases.

To celebrate the past two years, we’re highlighting 10 titles we think best show what Play Pass has to offer. If you want to keep the party going, you can dive into our full catalog of 950+ titles, and check out the new additions every month.

10 titles we ❤️

Editor’s note: Today at Google for Africa, Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced a $1 billion investment in Africa over five years to cover a range of initiatives, from improved connectivity to investments in startups. Below is an edited transcript of his remarks. Watch the full event above or on YouTube.

There is so much momentum happening across Africa, and we’re excited to showcase it at our first Google for Africa event.

Of course, there are also significant challenges. The pandemic continues to deeply impact communities across the continent and around the world. I hope everyone is taking care during these difficult times.

One thing we’ve seen is how technology can be a lifeline, whether you are a parent seeking information to keep your family healthy, a student learning virtually or an entrepreneur connecting with new customers and markets. Being helpful in these moments is at the core of our mission: to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.

Expanding opportunity through technology is deeply personal to me. That’s because I grew up without much access to it. Every new technology — from the rotary phone to the television — changed my family’s life for the better. That’s why I’m a technology optimist. I believe in how people can harness it for good.

I see so many examples across Africa today, whether it’s startups like Tambua Health that are using machine learning to help doctors diagnose and treat diseases, or entrepreneurs like Tunji, whom I had the chance to meet when I was in Lagos in 2017. His company, Gidi Mobile, is helping low-income students in Nigeria access online learning.

Increasingly we are seeing innovation begin in Africa, and then spread throughout the world. For example, people in Africa were among the first to access the internet through a phone rather than a computer. And mobile money was ubiquitous in Kenya before it was adopted by the world.

This momentum will only increase as 300 million people come online in Africa over the next five years. Many of them are young, creative and entrepreneurial, and they’re ready to drive new innovation and opportunity across the region.

It’s been incredible to see the rapid pace of change in a short amount of time, and be a partner on that journey. Since we opened our first offices in Africa, we’ve enabled 100 million Africans to access the internet for the first time and empowered millions of businesses and creators with digital tools.

A big focus has been on expanding opportunity through digital skills. In 2017, we committed to help 10 million Africans get the digital skills they need to grow their careers and businesses. So far, we’ve trained six million people. We’ve also trained 80,000 developers from every country in Africa and supported more than 80 startups to raise global venture capital funding, creating thousands of jobs.

In 2018, we opened an artificial intelligence research center in Accra. The team is focused on solving challenges relevant to Africa and the world, like using AI to map buildings that are hard to detect using traditional tools and adding 200,000 kilometers of roads on Google Maps.

And we continue to build for Africa’s unique needs. Products like Android Go and Files Go ensure that everyone can have a great smartphone experience. On YouTube, we are supporting Black creators and artists with our Black Voices Fund.

These are just a few examples of how we’re investing in, and building for, Africa. We know there’s more we can do to help bring the benefits of technology to more Africans.

So today I’m excited to announce that we plan to invest one billion dollars in Africa over five years. It will cover a range of initiatives, from improving connectivity to investing in startups.

These investments will support the continent’s digital transformation in four key areas:

• Enabling affordable access and building products for every kind of African user.
• Helping businesses with their digital transformation.
• Investing in entrepreneurs to spur next-generation technologies.
• Supporting nonprofits working to improve lives across Africa.

As we make these investments, we know we can’t do this alone. We look forward to partnering with African governments, policymakers, educators, entrepreneurs and businesses. We have so much opportunity ahead as Africans shape the next wave of innovation. Thank you for the chance to be a part of it.

Creativity in Africa is not something new — it dates back thousands of years and continues into the present day. In fact, some of the earliest paintings by humans were found engraved in a cave in South Africa 20,000 years ago. The Cradle of Creativity, a new project on Google Arts & Culture, explores how creativity evolved in Africa from rock art to contemporary brush strokes. In collaboration with the Yemisi Shyllon Museum of Art (YSMA) in Nigeria and the Origins Centre in South Africa, you can now explore 50 expertly-curated stories, featuring over 60 high-resolution Gigapixel images of artworks digitized using the Google Art Camera, 17 Street View virtual tours and, for teachers and students, a dedicatedlesson plan.

Here are 4 fun ways to get you started on a journey of creativity in Africa:

Early human inventions

Are you a student or a teacher? We have also created a dedicatedlesson plan for you. Visit g.co/google4africa21 if you want to continue your exploration, or download Google Arts & Culture’s Android or iOS app to further immerse yourself in the cradle of creativity!

Last month, we shared new sustainability initiatives from our travel team, including ways you can find eco-certified hotels on Google. Now, we’re bringing information on carbon emissions directly into Google Flights.

Beginning today, you’ll see a carbon emissions estimate for nearly every flight in the search results — right next to the price and duration of the flight. So when you’re choosing among flights of similar cost or timing, you can also factor carbon emissions into your decision.

These emissions estimates are flight-specific as well as seat-specific. For instance, newer aircraft are generally less polluting than older aircraft, and emissions increase for premium economy and first-class seats because they take up more space and account for a larger share of total emissions. 

To put these estimates in context, flights with significantly lower emissions will be labeled with a green badge. And if you want to prioritize carbon impact, you can sort all of the results to bring the greenest flights to the top of the list.

To produce these estimates, we’re combining data from the European Environmental Agency with the flight-specific information we get from airlines and other providers such as aircraft type, trip distance and the number of seats in each seating class. To learn more on how we estimate emissions, visit our Help Center.

It’s critical that people can find consistent and accurate carbon emissions estimates no matter where they want to research or book their trip. That’s why we recently joined the Travalyst coalition, where we’ll help develop an open model for calculating carbon emissions from air travel and promote standardization across the travel industry using this framework.

This update to Google Flights is just one of the many ways we’re helping people make sustainable choices in their everyday lives. Read the latest in this post from Sundar Pichai.

Many people are eager to live more sustainably and help address one of our generation’s most profound challenges: climate change. At Nest, we believe taking small, simple actions every day is a great way to start. Homes are some of the largest consumers of energy in the U.S., and over the past decade, Nest thermostats have helped people save over 80 billion kWh of energy at home — enough to power 23 million electric cars for a year.

But we know people want to do even more at home to help our planet. The problem is that it can be hard to know where to start and whether you’re making a real difference.

That’s why today we’re announcing Nest Renew — a service for your Nest thermostat that makes it easy to support a clean energy future, right from home.

Support clean energy with your Nest thermostat

Nest thermostats have always helped you heat and cool your home more efficiently, while also keeping you comfortable. They can now do even more with a Nest Renew feature called Energy Shift.

The electricity that powers our homes comes from different energy sources that vary based on the time of day — often a mix of clean energy (like solar and wind farms) and not-so-clean, fossil fuel-based energy (like gas and coal). Energy Shift works with your thermostat to help you automatically shift your heating and cooling electricity usage to times when your grid is cleaner, without sacrificing comfort. It can also adjust your thermostat’s schedule to run even more efficiently in both summer and winter.

Some electricity providers have time-of-use rates, where costs vary by time of day. If you’re on a plan like that, Energy Shift can help you save by automatically shifting usage to less expensive energy times.

We make these shifts while maintaining the comfort in your home — but you always have the ability to adjust your thermostat directly.

See your impact and your power

Nest Renew comes with monthly impact reports, so you can track the difference you and the Nest Renew community are making. It also shows you when the electricity coming into your home is cleaner and when it’s not so clean throughout the day, so you can make more informed choices — like running the washing machine a little earlier or later, when your grid is cleaner.

Today, Google announced Nest Renew — a service built on the premise that to address climate change, we need a more flexible electricity grid. And that grid should be integrated with a wide range of distributed energy resources, like those found in smart homes.

But we can’t accomplish this without engaged consumers and a broad coalition of both local and national partners working together. That’s why today, we’re partnering with a number of energy providers and nonprofits that are committed to collaborating to create a clean energy future.

How we’re partnering with energy providers

To start, we’re partnering with AES, Consumers Energy, Duke Energy, NRG, Portland General Electric, Southern California Edison and Southern Company — some of the most innovative energy providers in the country that are committed to the Nest Renew vision and a carbon-free, resilient energy grid. These partners have provided invaluable insight and feedback as we’ve defined the Nest Renew service.

Through Nest Renew, energy providers will have new opportunities to engage consumers with time-of-use rates, increase demand response program participation and facilitate consumer support for renewable energy. For customers, it will be an opportunity to better understand and control their energy usage and prioritize the use of carbon-free energy.

Nest Renew also will increase enrollments in energy provider-sponsored Rush Hour Rewards programs, which let customers earn rewards for using less when energy consumption is high and make it easier for utilities to manage the grid during times of peak demand. We’re already working with a number of partners to deliver these programs in over 80 utility territories and wholesale markets, covering more than 40% of consumers in the U.S.

We’re also partnering with Uplight to make it easier in the future for customers to link their utility accounts to unlock personalized energy savings insights, program recommendations and device rebates. Together, we aim to help customers and utilities reach their load management goals.

This is just the start of our collaboration on Nest Renew. We’re always looking to partner with more energy providers on our work towards decarbonization.

How we’re partnering on Clean Energy Match

We’re also working with partners to support the growth of clean energy with Nest Renew Premium’s Clean Energy Match. During early preview, we will source Nest Renew’s renewable energy credits from the Southern Company Bethel Wind plant in Castro County, Texas. In 2023, they will also come from the future Roseland Solar project in Falls County, TX. These plants will both help meet Google’s ongoing commitment to match 100% of its global annual electricity use with renewable energy and support its goal to operate entirely on24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030. You can learn more about Clean Energy Match in our deep dive article.

We’re also partnering with AES and NRG to identify or develop the wind and solar that can generate RECs for Clean Energy Match, as well as collaborating with Consumers and SCE with the aim of supporting their renewable deployment efforts.

How we’re partnering with nonprofits

Through the Energy Impact Program, customers earn Leafs by actively using Nest Renew and taking actions at home that can save energy and help the environment. As they reach certain Leaf milestones, in certain states they can vote to direct Nest Renew funds to their choice of nonprofits from our list of partners across the U.S. Our founding nonprofit partners are GRID Alternatives and Elevate. We’ll work with them to understand how Nest Renew can have the most impact.

And we’re always looking to collaborate with more local partners to expand the reach of the Energy Impact Program.

Learn more

You can learn more about Nest Renew in our blog post, as well as our deep dive into the service. You can also read a white paper by RMI, formerly the Rocky Mountain Institute, which concludes that products like Nest Renew could significantly reduce the carbon emissions associated with household energy use.

According to RMI, if 10 million households participate, Nest Renew could address approximately 7% of the gap between today’s level of household emissions and a 50% reduction in line with the current overall U.S. policy target. That’s the equivalent of powering about 50 million EVs with a cleaner grid each year, as opposed to today’s fossil-fuel heavy grid.

Climate change is no longer a distant threat — it’s increasingly local and personal. Around the world, wildfires, flooding and other extreme weather continue to affect our health, our economies and our future together on our planet. We need urgent and meaningful solutions to address this pressing challenge. That’s why last year we committed to bold action to run our data centers and campuses on 24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030.

Companies aren’t the only ones asking what more we can do to help the planet — increasingly people are asking themselves those questions, too. So today we’re sharing several new ways people can use Google’s products to make sustainable choices. Among them, we’re introducing new features to book flights or purchase appliances that have lower carbon footprints, a Nest program to support clean energy from home, and eco-friendly routing on Google Maps — which is rolling out today. And when people come to Google Search with questions about climate change, we’ll show authoritative information from sources like the United Nations, in addition to the existing news sources that we currently raise up in the carousel. It’s all part of our goal to help one billion people make more sustainable choices by 2022.

Travel and shop more sustainably

We’re adding new features to help make decisions about travel — from what flights to book to where to stay. Launching globally today, we’re bringing carbon emissions information to Google Flights. You’ll be able to see associated carbon emissions per seat for every flight, and quickly find lower-carbon options. And when you search for hotels, you’ll see information on their sustainability efforts, from waste reduction and water conservation measures to whether they’re Green Key or EarthCheck certified.

We’re also helping people make more sustainable choices when they shop, starting with home appliances. When you search for energy-intensive products like furnaces, dishwashers or water heaters, suggestions in the Shopping tab will help narrow your search to cost-effective and sustainable options.

Supporting clean energy from home

For over a decade, Nest thermostats have helped people save energy at home. Today we are taking these efforts a step further with a new service called Nest Renew. Using a feature called Energy Shift, compatible Nest thermostats can help users automatically shift electricity usage for heating and cooling to times when energy is cleaner or less expensive. For those who want to do more to help support the growth of clean energy, we will offer a paid subscription option, Renew Premium, that will match your fossil fuel electricity at home with high-quality renewable energy credits generated from the same projects in Google’s energy portfolio.

Getting around more sustainably

Traveling by car is one of the more carbon-intensive choices people make on a daily basis. Starting today in the U.S., and in Europe in 2022, Google Maps will let you choose the most fuel-efficient route if it isn’t already the fastest one. We estimate that this could save over one million tons of carbon emissions per year — the equivalent of removing over 200,000 cars from the road — and save you money by reducing fuel consumption.

We’re also working to make sure the cars that remain on the road are eco-friendly. On Search, we’re making it easier to see hybrid and electric vehicle options, compare them against gas-powered models, and find rebates so you know the true cost before you buy. These features will start to roll out in the U.S. this year, with more to come in 2022.

Of course, the most sustainable choice often doesn’t involve a car at all. That’s why we’re introducing lite navigation for cyclists on Maps, and making it simpler to find bikes and scooter shares in over 300 cities around the world.

AI for more efficient traffic lights