When we first introduced our real-time search features last December, we focused on bringing relevance to the freshest information on the web. Our goal was to provide real-time content from a comprehensive set of sources, integrated right into your usual search results. Today we’re making our most significant enhancements to date, giving real-time information its own home and more powerful tools to help you find what you need. Now you can access Google Realtime Search at its own address, www.google.com/realtime (the page is rolling out now and should be available soon. Use this link if you want to try out the new features right away) . On the new homepage you’ll find some great tools to help you refine and understand your results. First, you can use geographic refinements to find updates and news near you, or in a region you specify. So if you’re traveling to Los Angeles this summer, you can check out tweets from Angelenos to get ideas for activities happening right where you are. In addition, we’ve added a conversations view, making it easy to follow a discussion on the real-time web. Often a single tweet sparks a larger conversation of re-tweets and other replies, but to put it together you have to click through a bunch of links and figure it out yourself. With the new “full conversation” feature, you can browse the entire conversation in a single glance. We organize the tweets from oldest to newest and indent so you quickly see how the conversation developed. Finally, we’ve also added updates content to Google Alerts, making it easy to stay informed about a topic of your choosing. Now you can create an alert specifically for “updates” to get an email the moment your topic appears on Twitter or other short-form services. Or, if you want to manage your email volume, you can set alerts to email you once per day or week. Check out our demo video of the new features and quick tips on how to use them: You can access Realtime Search by typing www.google.com/realtime directly into your browser, or clicking the “Updates” link in the left-hand panel of your search results. Set up your Google Alerts at www.google.com/alerts . Realtime Search and updates in Google Alerts are available globally in 40 languages, and the geographic refinements and conversations views are available in English, Japanese, Russian and Spanish. The features are rolling out now, but you can use this link to see them right away. Posted by Dylan Casey, Product Manager

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Google Realtime Search: a new home with new tools

Government police shutting down farmer’s protests in China. A tobacco company employing under-age workers in Kazakhstan. Iranian merchants striking to protest tax increases in Tehran. We’ve seen stories like these on our computers and phones every day, and YouTube has been documenting many of them on our breaking news feed on Citizentube over the past few months. Videos like these are more than just breaking news images; they’re often political statements meant to bring about change. Earlier this summer YouTube started a blog series with WITNESS, a human rights video advocacy and training organization, examining the role of online video in human rights. So far we’ve talked about why video matters to human rights and how you can protect yourself and the people you film when uploading to YouTube. Now we want to raise some key topics about the future of human rights video online, and to hear your thoughts and ideas in a special Moderator series that we’ve set up. Read more about this project on the YouTube blog. Posted by Steve Grove, Head of News & Politics, YouTube, and Sameer Padania for WITNESS

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What do you think about human rights (and your rights) online?

This is part of our summer series of new Search Stories. Look for the label Search Stories and subscribe to the series. -Ed. Recently, a group of Google product managers challenged one another to run 100 miles over 30 days in the interest of encouraging summer fitness. I grew up in Huntsville, AL, where I always loved exercising and experiencing the great outdoors, so I took to the challenge immediately. One hundred and thirty-three miles and a few pairs of new running shoes later, it was an incredible opportunity to push myself further than I’d ever imagined. But, I must admit—it wasn’t easy. I’m delighted to help introduce our latest Search Story, Healthy Habits. This is a story of one woman’s journey to get back into shape. It shows the difficulties of sticking to a workout routine, and the empowerment that comes with reaching—and even exceeding your goals. It highlights the many tools and tricks that make Google a great workout companion, and I hope it inspires you to incorporate new healthy habits into your own lifestyle. Enjoy this week’s video, and don’t forget to check out the other videos if you haven’t already. Search (and run) on! Posted by Avni Shah, Group Product Manager, Geo

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Our latest search story: run on

This is part of our summer series of new Search Stories. Look for the label Search Stories and subscribe to the series. -Ed. Having been a new dad for six months now, I’ve quickly come to learn two valuable parenting lessons. First, being a father is truly a full-time job—and second, sleep is completely overrated. Whether buying the latest bottles, binkies, blankets and bibs, or just blogging about the whole magical journey, becoming a father has been the most invigorating and moving experience of my lifetime. This week, I’m excited to help introduce our latest search story, New Baby . The video really captures the joys (and costs!) of becoming a new parent. I’d like to share my heart-felt compassion with new dads everywhere (and of course, my wife and the other mothers out there who are the true heroes.) We will all rest when they head off to college—in the meantime, enjoy! Posted by Murali Viswanathan, Product Manager

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What to search when you’re expecting

Last November , we added legal opinions to Google Scholar. Legal opinions consider serious issues and help refine the laws that govern our country—but they can also be surprisingly entertaining. We’ve shared some of these for your summer reading pleasure on the Google Scholar blog . Rimes v. Curb Records, Inc., 2001 the opinion is written as a series of songs to be sung to tunes by LeAnn Rimes. It starts: LeAnn Rimes A very rich and famous star Wasn’t so rich in times afar But what a talent she had! Read the rest on the Google Scholar blog . Posted by Anurag Acharya, Distinguished Engineer

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Light summer reading: entertaining legal opinions

Google Analytics workshops and seminars are happening everywhere this summer! If you’ve had excuses in the past, there’s now no excuse not to take a day of training to become an expert and get a leg up. Chances are there’s one happening near you when you’re available — just take a look at the Google Analytics seminars offered on the Seminars For Success portal. These are one day seminars, either beginner or advanced, where you’ll ramp up into a high proficiency or fine tune your knowledge with fantastic instructors. Over the next 3 months, they are happening in: Berkeley, CA Austin, TX Washington, DC Los Angeles, CA San Diego, CA Boston, MA Dallas, TX And internationally, you can attend seminars in Glasgow, Manchester, London, Melbourne or Sydney. They’re inexpensive, and you’ll get a lot of bang for your buck, including hands on instruction, an AdWords credit, educational materials and some more good stuff. Take a look and register! And then, after the Summer ends, there will be more opportunities to learn about Google Analytics, and here’s one we want to highlight. The SMX East conference is a fantastic place to bone up on the latest in the world of SEM, SEO, social media marketing, analytics and more. In partnership with SMX East, Feras Alhlou, Principal Marketing Consultant @ E-Nor (a Google Analytics Certified Partner ) will be conducting a full day workshop on Google Analytics at the conference. When registering at this page , you’ll see a workshops option, including Google Analytics - that’s the one you want. Whether you are a marketer or a webmaster, this workshop will help you help give you more clarity and help you take the right action. I’ve attended Feras’ workshops before, and they’re insightful, practical, inspiring and helpful. Here’s the workshop agenda: Morning Session – Marketer/Business Focus – Strategy & Planning Web Analytics Strategy – approach, opportunities and limitations How It Works – overview, accuracy and privacy implications, integrating with other data Practical – understanding the user interface Advanced Features Overview – clever stuff you can do with Google Analytics Afternoon Session – Webmaster/Technical Focus – Implementation Accounts & Profiles, Filters & Goals – structure your data properly External Campaign Tracking – measure performance of search, email & banner campaigns Reporting – dashboards & insights Advanced Segmentation & Custom Reports – powerful ways to find insights Need more incentive? Register before July 30 and save money on the Super Early Bird Special. That’s not enough? Here is a discount code for $100 discount: smx100gaw (case sensitive) or simply you can use this URL: https://www.eiseverywhere.com/east10?discountcode=smx100gaw Get your analytics expertise in shape and you’ll be ahead of the curve in no time, building practical skills in a tool near and dear to our hearts. Posted by Jeff Gillis, Google Analytics Team

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Summer Excuses?

Google Analytics workshops and seminars are happening everywhere this summer! If you’ve had excuses in the past, there’s now no excuse not to take a day of training to become an expert and get a leg up. Chances are there’s one happening near you when you’re available — just take a look at the Google Analytics seminars offered on the Seminars For Success portal. These are one day seminars, either beginner or advanced, where you’ll ramp up into a high proficiency or fine tune your knowledge with fantastic instructors. Over the next 3 months, they are happening in: Berkeley, CA Austin, TX Washington, DC Los Angeles, CA San Diego, CA Boston, MA Dallas, TX And internationally, you can attend seminars in Glasgow, Manchester, London, Melbourne or Sydney. They’re inexpensive, and you’ll get a lot of bang for your buck, including hands on instruction, an AdWords credit, educational materials and some more good stuff. Take a look and register! And then, after the Summer ends, there will be more opportunities to learn about Google Analytics, and here’s one we want to highlight. The SMX East conference is a fantastic place to bone up on the latest in the world of SEM, SEO, social media marketing, analytics and more. In partnership with SMX East, Feras Alhlou, Principal Marketing Consultant @ E-Nor (a Google Analytics Certified Partner ) will be conducting a full day workshop on Google Analytics at the conference. When registering at this page , you’ll see a workshops option, including Google Analytics - that’s the one you want. Whether you are a marketer or a webmaster, this workshop will help you help give you more clarity and help you take the right action. I’ve attended Feras’ workshops before, and they’re insightful, practical, inspiring and helpful. Here’s the workshop agenda: Morning Session – Marketer/Business Focus – Strategy & Planning Web Analytics Strategy – approach, opportunities and limitations How It Works – overview, accuracy and privacy implications, integrating with other data Practical – understanding the user interface Advanced Features Overview – clever stuff you can do with Google Analytics Afternoon Session – Webmaster/Technical Focus – Implementation Accounts & Profiles, Filters & Goals – structure your data properly External Campaign Tracking – measure performance of search, email & banner campaigns Reporting – dashboards & insights Advanced Segmentation & Custom Reports – powerful ways to find insights Need more incentive? Register before July 30 and save money on the Super Early Bird Special. That’s not enough? Here is a discount code for $100 discount: smx100gaw (case sensitive) or simply you can use this URL: https://www.eiseverywhere.com/east10?discountcode=smx100gaw Get your analytics expertise in shape and you’ll be ahead of the curve in no time, building practical skills in a tool near and dear to our hearts. Posted by Jeff Gillis, Google Analytics Team

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Summer Excuses?

(Cross-posted with the Google Enterprise Blog ) From time to time we invite guests to blog about initiatives of interest, and are very pleased to have Geoff Greene join us here. Geoff is the Director of IT Support Services at Brown University, and here he shares an update on their campus-wide migration to Google Apps for Education for all students, staff and faculty. - Ed. About a year ago we put our 6,000 undergraduate students on Google Apps. The results were phenomenal: people were happy, they were productive, they were excited…and then some people got jealous. Our faculty and staff members started coming to us asking “When do we get to go Google?” Turns out they also wanted access to the same tools to better connect and engage with students and with each other. We thought about it for a bit and realized that they had a point. So we decided to bring the entire Brown University community together—faculty, staff, medical and grad students—with a common set of tools: Google Apps for Education . This summer, our Computing & Information Services team is in the process of migrating everyone to our new GoogleApps@Brown system. The positive experience our undergrads have had using the Apps suite helped our Provost David Kertzer decide that the change would bring significant benefits and cost savings to the university as a whole. In fact, we predict this change could save us somewhere around $1 million each year. Our students were really the ones that led us down the Google path. They knew these tools would work because they already used them in their non-school lives. We also decided to go this direction because of the functionalities that we believe will bring our university together, namely tools like collaborative documents, better email (with nearly 30 times the storage space we had with our previous system!) and video chat. The icing on the cake is that we signed a zero dollar contract for all these top-notch tools. But it’s not just about saving money—it’s also about investing in our university’s future. Google Apps helps us work better together, and we can feel the excitement building on campus as a result. Here’s a little glimpse: Since some faculty and staff members aren’t as familiar with the new tools just yet, we also hosted a “roadshow” to spread the word and gear up training sessions tailored for each campus group or department. Our training efforts are robust (you can check it out at training.brown.edu ) and we have Google Guides—enthusiastic staff and student volunteers—helping their peers with the transition. We feel confident that once people start using these tools together, they’ll never look back. Posted by Geoff Greene, Brown University Computing & Information Services

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Brown University has gone Google

This is part of our summer series of new Search Stories. Look for the label Search Stories and subscribe to the series. -Ed. My dad’s family grew up in Vietnam. Even as they faced an uncertain future, they attended school, believing strongly in the value of education. So when my aunts and uncles immigrated to the U.S., they went to great lengths to make sure their sons and daughters had the best opportunities. It wasn’t always easy—learning a new language and finding a new job was a struggle at first. But through their selfless efforts, my cousins and I were able to excel in our studies and pursue college degrees. So for this reason, and on behalf of the Search Stories team, I’m delighted to introduce our latest video, Graduation . It’s both poignant and relevant to my family’s own experiences, and I think it speaks to devoted caregivers the world over. Visit www.youtube.com/searchstories to check out the whole collection, or to create your own story. Posted by Dana Nguyen, Product Marketing Manager, Google Apps Education

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Graduation: our latest Search Story

This is part of our summer series of new Search Stories. Look for the label Search Stories and subscribe to the series. -Ed. Our latest Search Story, Father and Daughter , is a tribute to all the wonderful relationships dads have with their daughters. While working on the story we came across a comment posted to Paul Simon’s Father and Daughter video on YouTube. Maybe it’s because I’m a father of two little girls, but this almost made me cry. One day, I hope that my daughters will feel compelled to write something like this. To Cullenlvr961: we don’t know if you’ll read this or see the video, but we just wanted to put it out there and let you know you really touched us and we’re dedicating this Search Story to you and your dad. We’ll be proud if our video evokes even a small piece of the emotion your note did. Posted by Robert Wong, Google Creative Lab

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A Father’s Day dedication