Google Asia Pacific Blog: China

Veewo: An indie developer’s passion for beautiful games

Monday, September 19, 2016

Founded in 2011, Veewo is an independent game developer based in Xiamen, China. Their games include Just Get 10 and the recent hit Super Phantom Cat which was downloaded 120,000 times in a single week on Google Play. As part of our series of interviews with entrepreneurs across Asia Pacific, we spoke with Jason Yeung, CEO and co-founder, to find out just how this small developer studio in China has made serious strides in gaming around the world.

Tell us about Veewo in just one sentence.
Veewo’s vision is to perfectly replicate the original game playing experience on mobile.

Why did you choose to become a developer?
Games were always a source of great joy for me growing up. I became a developer because I wanted to bring this same sense of happiness to game lovers all over the world.

What lessons have you learned along the way?
Over the years, I’ve learned the importance of collaboration and why it’s so important to build a great team.

The Veewo family celebrate success

The one thing everyone at Veewo has in common is a love for design. Despite our different roles, we all consider ourselves designers at heart, and so we’re all focused on and pride ourselves on making small, but truly beautiful games. We’re also always open to working on each other’s projects or getting involved in different areas of expertise, so there’s always fresh insight.

Everyone at Weevo is a designer, with creative spaces to inspire

Another thing I’ve learned is just how fierce competition is. There is so much to choose from in the mobile gaming market, making it tough to stand out and become profitable.

What is your advice for anyone who wants to get started as a developer?
Never try to build the next big thing when you are just starting out. Focus on what you can realistically achieve with tight timelines and small budgets, and get it out there to test it. Producing a small number of really well-made games is your best bet to finding product-market fit.

Indie teams should also think about how they promote their product in the early stages. We see a lot of small shops just focusing on the build, and that’s simply not enough!

If you’re an indie developer, you may not necessarily have the financial resources to put towards user acquisition. This is another reason why it’s important to offer a great user experience. This is why we are constantly looking to improve and build with Android’s latest tools.

With dedicated fans across the world, how do you stay connected to your global players?
One of the coolest things about being on Google Play is seeing our games go global. A lot of our most dedicated players are actually based in the U.S. On Google Play, game comments are automatically translated. This really helps us maintain a close relationship with our fans. We take their feedback very seriously and Google Play tools allow us to connect to our players no matter where they are from.

What's next for your company? What are some of your hopes for the future?
We are developing a game I am really excited about called Super Phantom Cat II. It will have more beautiful graphics, including ones that depict activities such as parkour and swimming. Stay tuned!

Who’s your Internet idol and why?
Satoru Iwata at Nintendo is absolutely my idol. I’ve always looked up to developers at Nintendo. I would like to think that Veewo Games sort of pays homage to the Nintendo games I used to play as a kid. My team strives to recreate that same experience we all had as kids before the era of mobile gaming, and we believe that video games should be focused on happiness and joy, not violence or war.

The Art of Chinese Crafts across a thousand canvases

Thursday, August 25, 2016

China’s rich crafts heritage dates back many centuries. But as traditions evolve and time passes, many of these arts and crafts are at risk of being lost forever. This is why we’re pleased to open “The Art of Chinese Crafts” on the Google Arts & Culture platform—a digital collection that brings together thousands of years, untold artists and infinitive inspiration in a single online destination for people around the world to see. We also hope it will help safeguard these national treasures for future generations to enjoy and appreciate.

There are plenty of treasures to discover with 38 new exhibitions and over 1,800 new artifacts from six partners, including the Arts & Crafts Museum Hangzhou, China Intangible Heritage Industry Alliance, China Paper Cutting Museum, Museum of Ethnic Costumes, Museum of Ethnic Cultures, and Soyim.

Preserving Miao traditions
The Miao people’s crafts are well-known throughout China, but not everyone practices these age-old traditions anymore. This puts much of their heritage at risk of disappearing. With exhibits from across several partner museums, you can explore their culture’s tangible and intangible heritage.

Starting with the Miao-style Oxhorn-shaped hair ornament from the collection of the Museum of Ethnic Costumes, you can zoom in to discover the butterfly, phoenix and centipede motifs carved into this silver headdress which is often worn by young Miao women on Zimei Jie, or Sisters’ Day.

Miao-style Oxhorn-shaped hair ornament, Museum of Ethnic Costumes

And then learn about the dozen or so different processes and techniques that go into the Miao silversmith’s work, many of which have been passed from one generation to the next.

You can also learn more about the Zimei Festival, when Miao boys and girls exchange sticky rice and love songs in an elaborate courtship ritual in the springtime.

Crafts across many canvases
The "Art of Chinese Crafts" collection spans across many mediums, from silver to silk, to paper and peach pits too.

Marvel at the collection at the Soyim by miniatures artist Tian Hongbo, whose intricate designs have been carved into peach stones.

Flying Kites (left) and Dragon Boat (right) by Tian Hongbo at Soyim

Unfold one of the many ornate folding fans at the Hangzhou Arts & Crafts Museum and discover how they emerged as a symbol of wisdom and grace rather than a cooling device.

And zoom into the fine lines of cut-paper paintings at the China Paper Cutting Museum. More recent pieces such as Li Haixia’s “A Delight to Watch” may even remind you of the Miao silver carvings.

"A Delight to Watch" by Li Haixia, China Paper Cutting Museum

These exhibits and much more are waiting to be explored on the Google Arts & Culture platform, or on the iOS and Android apps. We’re excited to be working with our partners to use our technology to digitize these fine examples of Chinese crafts and folklore, and preserve them online for people around the world to admire for years to come.

Posted by Simon Rein, Program Manager, Google Cultural Institute

Google Science Fair 2016: Meet the Community Impact Award finalists from Asia Pacific

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Update 19 July: We're pleased to announce that Advay Ramesh has won the Community Impact Award, Asia for his mobile GPS that helps keep fishermen safe from invisible maritime boundary lines. You can read more about his project below.

In addition, we're excited to share the Top 100 ideas selected by the judges, which are now in the running to become one of 16 Global Finalists later this year. These include submissions from students in Australia, Bangladesh, Hong Kong, India, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Taiwan. Check out the full list of the 100 Google Science Fair Regional Finalists here.

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Editor's note: This year, we're celebrating 25 innovative Community Impact student projects across the globe that solve community and health resource challenges with science. While we're featuring the finalists from Asia Pacific below, you can read more about all the finalists' projects on the Google for Education blog.

Through the Google Science Fair, we've invited today's brightest young minds to answer an important question: how can they make the world better through science, math, and engineering? We received thousands of extremely impressive answers to this question from over 107 countries this year, and we can’t wait to announce the winners later in September.

Before that happens, though, we want to recognize the projects that aim to solve tough community challenges like providing clean drinking water, keeping people safe from natural disasters, and fighting droughts. This year, we'll be giving not just one, but five regional Community Impact Awards: one for each top project that focuses on fixing a difficult resource problem across Asia Pacific, North America, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East & Africa.

Please join us and our partners — LEGO Education, Scientific American, National Geographic and Virgin Galactic — in celebrating the Asia Pacific region Community Impact Award finalists below:

Keeping Fishermen Safe at Sea

In Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, Advay (14) was dismayed to hear how often local Rameswaram fishermen were captured and arrested for long periods of time due to making a simple mistake: crossing an International Maritime Boundary line it was impossible for them to see. Given the high penalties and impact to fishermen's livelihoods, Advay wanted to create an easy-to-use GPS system to send alerts when sailors approached maritime borders or when better fishing was available in another area. The system can also alert fishermen to dangerous weather conditions, so they can steer clear. Advay's invention is designed to work on any type of handheld mobile device, and he hopes that with it more local fishermen can avoid financial hardship and stay safe at sea.

Congo-ing Nuts: Making Dirty Water Clean

Like others in their local community in Singapore Tushmitha (15), Nagajothi (15), and Yan (15) come from diverse backgrounds. All too aware of how difficult it can be for people across India and Southeast Asia to access clean water, the trio wanted to create a safe, economical water filter. The students realized that while textile mills are a significant source of revenue for new economies in many developing countries in the region, they can also leave behind water contaminated with chemical dyes used to color fabrics. For their project, the group created a filter using the porous walnut shell to extract Congo Red dye, a common fabric dye, from polluted water. To their delight, their filter worked, proving that this biodegradable and common agricultural waste product just might be the perfect material to make local water safe to drink.

Avoiding Landfills with Shresto Pads

Growing up in Pakistan and Bangladesh opened Saliha's (15) eyes to the sheer volume of waste being generated by these densely populated areas, leading her community to host some of the world's largest landfills. Determined to find a solution to cut down on non-biodegradable waste, Saliha turned to a common personal hygiene item: sanitary pads. With the local economy booming with the sanitary industry, she knew it was only a matter of time before landfills would become overwhelmed with these products, which contain plastics and harmful chemicals. So, Saliha created a safer, chemical-free option made entirely of plant materials that will degrade in just two year's time. She hopes her new "Shresto" pads will help more local women feel comfortable while also making the environment safer for everyone.

The Next-Gen Greenhouse

Airin (17) hails from Kerala, India, a region known for beautiful tropical beaches and agriculture, specifically tea, coffee, and spice plantations. Given his community's dependence on farming, Airin was intrigued by a question: could he create a better greenhouse that could produce extra crops sustainably and remain safe for the environment? For his project, he created a greenhouse that recycles 100% of the carbon dioxide it produces. His design proved successful, quadrupling crop yields while also using less power, water, and money. Airin believes his greenhouse can help Kerala farmers increase their harvests and income while sparing the local air from pollution.

Forget Those Frozen Pipes!

In Shanghai, where temperatures can drop severely in winter due to Siberian winds, pipes can often freeze and burst, disrupting the community's access to water for hours or days at a time. While identifying a frozen pipe before it bursts is one path to solving the problem, Ying (17) realized it was more important to identify a pipe that was about to freeze and adjust water temperatures before thet become critical. She set herself the task of creating an engineering solution to monitor local pipes that can automatically send electrical currents to adjust water temperatures as needed. Ying hopes her design will help her local community avoid plumbing disasters during the coldest time of year.

Tune into the Google Science Fair website on July 18th to find out which five young scientists will win their regional Community Impact Award! With the generous support of our partners, winners will receive mentors and scholarships to help them further their education and inspiring projects.

To keep an eye on the competition, follow along on Google+ and Twitter.

Posted by Andrea Cohan, Program Lead, Google Science Fair

Helping Chinese entrepreneurs grow and go global

Thursday, April 14, 2016

Editor’s note: This post comes from Bob Zheng, Founder of People Squared, a network of tech hubs supporting China based entrepreneurs in Beijing and Shanghai.

China, with a population of over 1.3 billion, has one of the world's most vibrant startup ecosystems. There are more ‘unicorns’ (private companies valued at more than US$1 billion) in Beijing alone than anywhere else in the world other than Silicon Valley. But the accelerating pace of innovation coming from China doesn’t end with the well known companies, like Didi Chuxing and Xiaomi. There is a rapidly expanding group of new disruptors, small local startups growing, trying new things, and increasingly looking for ways to go global. These are the entrepreneurs we’re passionate about supporting on their journey.

That’s why we’re so thrilled to be joining the global Google for Entrepreneurs partner network today, as the first member from China. With this tremendous support from Google, in the form of financial resources and expertise, we hope to make the journey for these Chinese entrepreneurs into larger domestic and increasingly international markets a little quicker and a lot more successful.

As China’s earliest established and largest domestic co-working space, our mission at People Squared has been to create spaces that connect entrepreneurs. We have 20 spaces spread throughout Shanghai and Beijing, including a new space in ZhongGuanCun. Here are a few pics of what these spaces look like:

Since 2010, we have supported more than 10,000 members, and have become the proud home-base for many well known startups, including Fotoplace, Xiaozhu, Mofang, Get, Where to go Weekend and many more. So far, the 300 teams based at People Squared have raised more than US$300 million.

We’ve been working with great partners to help make this happen. At our ‘Hero Center’ space in Shanghai, for example, we work with organizations like Xinchejian, China Accelerator and Techyizu to establish a community that supports and engages the broader startup ecosystem. But we’d like to become the place where Chinese entrepreneurs start on a journey towards growing not just in China, but globally as well.

As a member of the Google for Entrepreneurs partner network now, we think we are well on the way. We’re super excited to announce that effective immediately our community will have access to work from more than 25 member spaces globally, from San Francisco to Sao Paulo to Sydney to Seoul, including Google’s 6 Campuses. They will also have access to a host of great programs Google runs for entrepreneurs, such as Google for Entrepreneurs Exchange, a series of week-long, vertically-specific global immersion programs aimed at helping startups gain access into new markets and insights.

This is an important opportunity for us and our members to learn from and collaborate with the best organizations helping startups globally. We can’t wait to see what kind of impact it will have on our community and the local startup ecosystem.

Posted by Bob Zheng, Founder of People Squared

Mr. Mon Kee’s Lunar New Year adventure

Friday, February 5, 2016

So...our Lunar New Year fun didn’t end with finding the ‘Monkeys of Street View’.

Enter, Mr. Mon Kee, a cute little paper monkey thrown together by a few Googlers in Singapore, who quickly proceeded to take on a life of his own.

He played Go in Singapore, took in the view (real and virtual) from level 73 at our office in Taipei 101, and he found himself a lovely treetop home amongst the cherry blossoms in our office in Shanghai.

Here are a few of our favorite shots of his adventures taken by Googlers:

Our “Moogler” visiting Google offices in, from top left, Singapore, Taipei, Shanghai, Beijing, and back to Shanghai again

We’ve had so much fun with him, we figured, why not share? So if you’d like to take your own Mr. Mon Kee on an adventure, print out the paper cut here, cut him out and fold him together – an exacto knife is helpful, but you can still manage with scissors if that’s all you’ve got.

If you then feel so inclined, go ahead and share your pics of Mr. Mon Kee with us on G+, Twitter or Facebook with the hashtag #MonkeyView. We’ll keep an eye out and give our favorites a shout out :)

Happy crafting! And, Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Posted by Katrin Maurer, Internal Communications, Google Greater China

Hey hey, it’s the Monkeys...of Street View

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

We’re pretty excited about the Year of the Monkey. What’s not to love – there are monkeys EVERYWHERE! In the mall, at the office, on TV.

But we wanted more. So as things slowed a bit at the office this week with the approach of Lunar New Year holidays, we started a little virtual monkey hunt to find as many of the ‘Monkeys of Street View’ as we could.

It’s been tons of fun – and you’re probably here after seeing a few of the ones we found already (scroll down a bit more to see these monkeys in all their Street View glory):

That’s great, we’ve found a few. But we really can’t get enough of these monkeys, so we’re asking for your help.

If you also find yourself with some downtime over the holiday, go ahead, go on a little virtual monkey hunt of your own on Street View and share any you find with us on G+, Twitter or Facebook with the hashtag #MonkeyView. We’ll be sure to give some +1’s and likes to our favorites, and we’ll add the best of them to the embeds below (complete with credit to the monkeys' finder, aka you!).

To give you a head start, here’s a map of where Street View is available...see anywhere where there might be some monkeys?

Here are the ones we’ve found on Street View so far:

We can't wait to see how many more monkeys you find. Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Posted by Cynthia Wei, Google Street View Program Manager

A whole new world for silk carpets, (hand)made in China

Wednesday, December 2, 2015

As part of our series of interviews with people across Asia-Pacific who use the Internet to create, connect, and grow, we asked Jianli Han how online tools helped grow his handmade silk carpets business, the Henan Yilong Carpet Company, into China’s largest exporter of handmade silk carpets.

How did you get into the carpet business?
Fresh out of university in the eighties, I was assigned a job in a state-owned enterprise in Nanyang, Henan province. The wife of a fellow worker was Uyghur and she excelled at weaving woolen carpets. Henan province was short of wool but had a long tradition of silk-making, so she tried to weave carpets with silk for personal use.

One year, I took one of her silk carpets to the Canton Fair, where I’d been assigned to work. I had put it in the corner, but on the first day of the fair, a businessman from Kuwait immediately picked it up for quite a tidy sum of money. It was then that I realized that silk products from Henan might be a promising business opportunity, and so I launched into it with the help of my fellow workers.

30 years later, we’re producing over 60,000 square metres of hand-knotted carpets every year, which is enough to cover 8 soccer pitches. Smaller carpets take several months, but larger pieces can take up to a year to make.

Why did you decide to sell carpets online?
Participating in overseas trade fairs was expensive. On top of registration fees, I had to ship several carpets and then send a number of colleagues to staff A booth. So I started looking for other ways to promote my business. In 2007, a friend told me about Google’s tools and products and showed me how to use them. After that, I decided to switch my investment from trade fairs to Google. On Google, you can be open and sell 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. You can easily get 100 times the customers online than you can from a trade fair.

You have a mobile-optimized website, but do people actually buy carpets on their phones?
In fact 80% of our buyers come via mobile search and the vast majority of them come from outside China. A hand-knotted silk carpet is something special, so people searching for them generally know quite a bit about what they’re looking for. Our website includes a lot of information about our products, making it easier for customers to find what they’re looking for — even a high price tag doesn’t discourages them. Also, mobile payments have enabled transactions to take place anywhere and everywhere.

Do you have any tips for other businesses wanting to use the Internet to grow?
User experience is the top priority. Your site should be optimized for mobile to guarantee a favorable customer experience when they make a purchase online. Apart from that I’d say it’s important to keep an open mind and be prepared to try to new things.

Finding Asian treasures in The Museum of the World

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

The British Museum opened its doors in 1759, offering free access to its 70,000 objects to all “students and curious persons.” The Google Cultural Institute has now made 4,500 of the museum’s eight million objects available for students, curious persons or anyone else with an Internet connection to see. For many who live in Asia-Pacific, this is a chance to pore over treasures from their region in far greater detail than even those in the museum can. Here are some of my favorite artifacts from Asia and Oceania:

The Admonitions Scroll by Gu Kaizhi (China, 6th century)

This 6th century Chinese scroll has been captured in super high-resolution—what we call gigapixel imagery—to give you a closer and more intimate view than you could ever get with the naked eye. Due to its fragile nature, it is displayed at the museum for only a few months of of the year; on the Cultural Institute, it can be accessed all year round. It tells the story of an instructress of the imperial court, who guides the ladies of the imperial family about correct behavior.

Gigapixel imagery enables users to experience the Admonitions Scroll in a way they would never be able to offline. The complete work can be seen on the left, and zoomed in detail on the right.

Miniature of Mughal Prince (India, 1610)

This miniature painting shows an encounter between a member of the Mughal elite and a holy figure. Measuring just 10.5cm wide and 22cm high, the fine details of this artwork are best seen close up—or by zooming in to the image on the Cultural Institute. You’ll be able to appreciate the incredible detail both in the foreground and background, and rich and subtle colors with a close and accurate depiction of nature.

Zoom in on the Cultural Institute to admire the fine details of this miniature painting.

Kakiemon elephants (Japan, 1650-1699)

These colorful porcelain elephants, which stand about one foot high, were made on the island of Kyushu in southern Japan. How did the potters know what they were making, when real elephants would not have been seen in Japan at this time? It’s likely that these were ordered specially by merchants of the Dutch East India Company for export, commissioned by design as ornaments for European mantelpieces.

Zoom in to admire the overglaze coloured enamels decorating these elephants

Moon jar (Korea, 1600-1800)

White, minimalist forms are not a modern invention. These “moon” jars were prized during the Joseon dynasty in Korea, symbolizing the Neo-Confucian ideals of purity and integrity. Play the audio guide to find out the fascinating history behind how this particular moon jar found its way into the British Museum’s collection.

Bark etching of a kangaroo hunt (Australia, 1800-1899)

The British Museum is home to one of the oldest surviving Aboriginal bark etchings. The etching is made of bark from a eucalyptus tree which was blackened by smoke from a fire. Zooming into the artifact, you’ll see that the sooty surface was incised to depict figures armed with boomerangs, spears and clubs hunting a kangaroo.

Carved Wooden Figure Known as A’a (Rurutu, 1700-1850)

This wooden statue from the island of Rurutu in Polynesia was presented to English missionaries in the early 19th century as the local population converted to Christianity. It has inspired several artists of the twentieth century, including the poet William Empson whose Homage to the British Museum drew a contrast between the religious power of the figure and its secular surroundings.

There is a supreme God in the ethnological section;

A hollow toad shape, faced with a blank shield.

[...] At the navel, at the points formally stressed, at the organs of sense,

Lice glue themselves, dolls, local deities,

His smooth wood creeps with all the creeds of the world. [...]

Being everything, let us admit that is to be something,

Or give ourselves the benefit of the doubt;

Let us offer our pinch of dust all to this God,

And grant his reign over the entire building.

The British Museum is not only worth a visit for the objects in its collection—it has some impressive architecture too. You can experience the Great Court and a view of the reading room, which was used for research and writing by Sun Yat-Sen, Bram Stoker and Karl Marx.

Go on a private tour of the museum whenever you want! This is the Queen Elizabeth II Great Court. The famous architect Lord Norman Foster transformed the Museum’s inner courtyard into the largest covered public square in Europe.

Through a special microsite called The Museum of the World, visitors to this virtual gallery can explore and make connections between developments across the world’s cultures.

Clicking on an artifact from India in the 16th century shows connections between related developments across the world’s cultures around the same period in history

The Museum of the World gives visitors a new way to experience the British Museum’s collections, providing a wealth of knowledge about the exhibits with just a few clicks of the mouse. Each artifact on virtual display is accompanied not just by a caption, but also a map identifying where the object hails from, an audio guide, and links to related cultural objects online.

Posted by Piotr Adamczyk, Program Manager, Google Cultural Institute

Lacquer on coffins and cookbooks on parchment: Here are a few of our favorite things from Korea, China, and Hong Kong

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

The Google Cultural Institute just added collections and exhibits from 19 new museums and cultural institutions from Korea, China, and Hong Kong. This brings the total amount of the Cultural Institute’s online works from Asian institutions to a staggering 23,000 pieces, from every genre imaginable: Chinese bronze-age bells, Korean dynastic robes, Hong Kong’s neon street signs, and more are all on the Cultural Institute in all their mind-bogglingly diverse array.

Here are a few of my favorite pieces, moving through history from ancient to modern:

A 2,300 year old coffin, skeletons not included

China’s Hubei Provincial Museum’s collection boasts this incredibly well preserved decorated lacquer coffin from the Eastern Zhou dynasty from 443 BC. You can practically see every bump in the wood grain as you zoom all the way into the gigapixel-resolution image.

Gigapixel images capture 1,000 times the information of a 1 megapixel digital camera, bringing artworks and artifacts alive in high-resolution with extraordinary detail, allowing the viewer to experience the work far beyond what is possible with the naked eye. In this round of launches, we added six gigapixels from Korea, seven from China, and one from Hong Kong.

The Dragon and Phoenix Coffin, Hubei Provincial Museum

Learn Korean cooking...from 340 years ago
Back then as it is today, Korea was known for its cuisine. Eumsikdimibang, or “recipes for tasty food,” is Korea’s oldest cookbook, written 340 years ago by a noblewoman in the late Joseon Dynasty. You won’t find any Korean Fried Chicken here though—this book includes recipes for traditional flour and rice cakes, fermented vegetables, and importantly, how to brew alcoholic beverages. This online exhibition from Korea’s Dimibang museum explains the history behind this important historic document, with videos that bring that culture and era to life.

The online exhibition Eumsikdimibang, and the book’s author Lady Jang Gye-hang, from Dimibang

Catch the action up close
Many traditional Chinese landscape paintings contained distinct narratives within the details—you might miss them if you don’t look closely. In this mid-18th century painting from the Hong Kong Maritime Museum, also rendered in gigapixel resolution, you can see the bewilderment on the locals’ faces on sampan boats as they look at the foreign ships encircling the port city of Canton, or modern-day Guangzhou.

This painting is the first gigapixel capture for a Hong Kong museum.

An Unglazed Painting of Canton (Guangzhou), Hong Kong Maritime Museum

Walk in a prince’s palace
Many of the museums coming onto the Cultural Institute are themselves architectural marvels, such as the Suzhou Museum in Suzhou, China, opened in 2006 by Pritzker Prize-winning architect, I.M. Pei, also known for designing the Grand Pyramid of the Louvre and the Bank of China building in Hong Kong. Learn more about Pei’s reimagining of a former prince’s palace from this online exhibition, and take a virtual stroll around the grounds thanks to Museum View technology.

Screen Shot 2015-05-18 at 1.24.17 PM.png

Admire I.M. Pei’s wing of the Suzhou Museum from both inside and out

All of the lights
The vibrant city of Hong Kong truly comes alive at night thanks to its iconic neon signs hanging higgeldy-piggeldy along every street. Sadly many of these signs are being phased out. Two new exhibitions by the West Kowloon Cultural District are preserving and celebrating Hong Kong’s neon lights. For a truly immersive experience, jump into one of the 12 Museum View panoramas of Hong Kong’s lit-up streets at night.

Take art with you
The Cultural Institute has built a mobile platform to enable museums to put their exhibits on a mobile app, so that these institutions can easily enhance a visitor’s museum experience with audio guides or virtual tours. Partners from Korea and Hong Kong are the first in Asia to launch their mobile apps using the Cultural Institute’s platform—you can find them on Google Play.

Mobile apps of the Seokdang Museum of Dong-A University, Korea, and St. James Settlement, Hong Kong

Whether it’s learning about Korean cooking from three centuries years ago, or taking a stroll around the grounds of Chinese palaces, we hope you’ll expand your horizons with the Google Cultural Institute.

Posted by Amit Sood, Director, Google Cultural Institute

Asian culture in the digital era

Friday, April 24, 2015

Since uniting 17 world famous art museums on its platform in 2011, Google Cultural Institute has come a long way and today brings together more than 700 cultural organizations from over 60 countries.

To understand how museums and archives are changing their relationships with an audience that consumes as much art on a screen as they do on a wall, we asked a researcher to speak with and develop case studies on several partners of the Google Cultural Institute in Australia, China, Korea and Russia.

Here's the full report and, below it, some key findings that caught our eye from the Asia-Pacific region.

Reaching new audiences
A museum can’t travel at the speed of light, but digital versions of its collections can. Museums are beginning to hunt for new international audiences for their Web sites and appeal to a wider range of people who might be willing to travel to the museum.

For example, the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Australia saw its website traffic grow after it joined Google Cultural Institute in 2012, to the point that it has now received over a million views.
And the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts in Russia saw a 30% increase in the museum’s website traffic within just a few days of joining the Google Cultural Institute back in 2011, with new audiences coming from Europe and America.

Museums are also convinced that these virtual visitors will be inspired to travel and explore their collections in real life. According to the Chinese Nanyue King Mausoleum Museum, the main goal of their participation in the project is to promote tourism in the country.

Revealing the unseen
Few museums can boast a huge physical space able to host thousands of visitors at once. Moreover, many valuable artifacts remain largely unseen by the public in hidden vaults and archives. But, there are no boundaries like this in a virtual display. After joining the Google Cultural Institute in 2014, the Dongdaemun Design Plaza in South Korea was able to open up their great hidden collections, installations and virtual performances to a global Internet audience, thus circumventing the problem of a restricted physical space.

Bringing local heritage to an international audience
Many museums have found new ways of exporting local culture through Internet to communicate their values to the global art lover community on Google Cultural Institute. The Korean Film Archive has sought new ways of telling the world about classic Korean movies. Together with Google, the archive was able to extend their brand and the accessibility of Korean films to a global audience.

These are just a few stories that we found inspiring about the groundbreaking new ways of exploring Art and Culture online. To learn more, take a look at the full brochure or watch museums share their own experiences of going digital on the Google Cultural Institute YouTube channel.

Posted by Luisella Mazza, Program Manager, Google Cultural Institute

The mobile Internet economy in Asia Pacific: what would you give up before your smartphone?

Thursday, February 12, 2015

Editors note: This post comes from Dominic Field, a partner and managing director at the Boston Consulting Group

Nowhere is the impact of the mobile Internet economy more evident than in Asia Pacific.

Mobile Internet revenues in five APAC nations—Australia, China, India, Japan and South Korea—total almost $300 billion, more than the U.S. and more than twice the five biggest economies in Europe combined. By 2017, we estimate that the five APAC nations’ mobile Internet revenues will more than double to $622 billion. The annual growth rate in India will be almost 40 percent.

Like everywhere else, consumers in Asia Pacific are the big winners. They get enormous value from their smartphones, tablets and other mobile services, as well as from the apps they install and the services they access. And costs are coming down fast, thanks to vibrant competition throughout the mobile ecosystem. The benefit consumers receive over and above what they pay for devices, apps, services and access can be quantified; economists call it consumer surplus. In the five APAC countries, this surplus totals $1.4 trillion a year. On a per person basis, the consumer surplus averages almost $3,000.

Here’s a snapshot of the mobile Internet’s impact in each of the five APAC countries surveyed in our new report, The Growth of the Global Mobile Internet Economy.

At 77 percent, Australia has the highest smartphone penetration of the five countries sampled (higher than Japan or South Korea), but there are still 8 percent of Aussies who would rather shower than give up their mobile Internet access.

Mobile Internet revenues in China ($144 billion in 2013) already exceed those of the EU5 (Germany, France, Italy, the UK and Spain) and they will increase two and a half times by 2017. The Chinese love their smartphones—30 percent would relinquish both showering and sex to keep their mobile Internet access.

India has the fastest growing mobile Internet economy of the five countries we measured. As network coverage expands, connectivity improves (from 2G to 3G and 4G) and costs come down, usage is expected to soar, with mobile Internet economic activity more than tripling between 2013 and 2017. And mobile commerce will grow from $6 billion in 2013 to more than $14 billion in 2017

Japanese consumers get the biggest per capita consumer surplus of the five countries sampled—almost $6,800 per person per year. Along with South Korea, Japan is perhaps the most mature mobile internet economy in the Asia Pacific region; Japanese consumers have been using mobile e-mail, contactless payments, and, streaming live video for two decades or more.

South Koreans are wed to their mobile devices. The country has the second highest mobile penetration rate in our sample—74 percent. Three-quarters of consumers would give up newspapers, chocolate, and fast food, and 60 percent alcohol and coffee. A third would abstain from sex and 20 percent from showering to keep their mobile Internet access.

Posted by Dominic Field, Partner and Managing Director, Boston Consulting Group

Google’s Year in Search: Asia’s hottest tech trends of 2014

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

As we look back at this year’s hottest trends, we give you the tech gadgetry and geeky moments that went truly viral in Asia. Check out google.com/2014 for lists of the most popular searches around the world. Enjoy!

The selfie stick

A spectre is haunting Asia—the spectre of the selfie stick. A phenomenon that first peaked in Malaysia, then jumped the straits to Indonesia, the skinny banner has been raised in the Philippines more times than in any other country. This humble stick has caused such a stir that even the South Korean government has apparently banned its sale—what could be the cause of such alarm?

The Philippines: the Himalayas of the selfie stick emergence. The US is just crawling out from the Mariana trenches of selfie stick searches.

In any case, if 2013 was the year of the selfie, 2014 was the year of the selfie stick (well, here in Asia, at least). As you can see from the chart above, people in Malaysia first started searching for selfie sticks on Google early this year, then by the summer Filipinos were all wielding the contraption, just as searches gained in popularity in Indonesia.

Speculations are rife as to why the selfie stick originated in Asia, and various countries contend for the title of selfie stick originator. We do know, however, that front-facing cameras were a fixture on Asian feature phones, long before smartphones even emerged. In the early days of flip phones in Japan, circa mid-2000s, Japanese carriers even promoted a whole campaign around “jidori” 自撮り or selfies, and encouraged people to email photos of themselves to their friends over WAP (remember that?!).

Whether you call it a monopod, 自拍神棍 (“selfie magic stick” in Chinese), or tongkat narsis (“narcissistic stick” in Indonesian), this phenomenon is truly on the rise in Asia—watch out, other regions, before it jumps the pond to a selfie-taker near you. And remember: you saw it here in Asia first.

Posted by Robin Moroney, Communications Manager, Google Asia Pacific

An armchair traveler’s top eight picks for the holiday season

Friday, November 21, 2014

The end of the year is just around the corner. Whether you’re planning to pack your bags and board a plane, or spend the holiday season closer to home, we’ve pulled together some of the most popular sites on the Google Cultural Institute to inspire your travel planning or help you explore the world from the comfort of your couch. From World Wonders to artifacts and artworks, get ready to go on an armchair adventure beginning in the heart of Europe, crossing over to the U.S. and ending up in a historical center of Southeast Asia.

1. Vincent van Gogh’s Starry Night at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris

Vincent Van Gogh is one of the most viewed artists on the Cultural Institute, and this rendition of “Starry Night” housed at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris attracts some of the greatest attention. In September 1888, Van Gogh wrote: "Often it seems to me night is even more richly coloured than day", and within the month, he realized this masterpiece.

2. 1900-2013: From station to the renovated Musée d’Orsay

Staying in Paris, Musée d’Orsay is home to the largest collection of impressionist and post-impressionist masterpieces. If Monet, Manet, and Rembrandt weren’t enough to draw a crowd, the history of the building attracts attention on its own. This beautifully curated exhibit entitled “1900-2013: From station to the renovated Musée d’Orsay”, takes you behind the scenes from its construction as a railway station at the end of the 19th century, to its days as a mailing center, before being converted into a museum in the 1980s.

3. Sandro Botticelli’s Birth of Venus at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence

Heading south to Italy, the crowds take us to the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Gradually make your way through the first floor galleries, before heading to the exhibit’s prized Birth of Venus by Sandro Botticelli on the second level. You won’t need to worry about the queue of people that’s typically waiting to stand before this landmark of 15th century Italian painting. The Cultural Institute allows you to zoom in and examine every crack and detail without getting elbowed aside.

4. Grand Canyon in Arizona

Jumping across the Atlantic Ocean takes us to the spectacular Grand Canyon in the U.S. state of Arizona. There are over 2,200 items in the Cultural Institute featuring one of the world’s most dramatic geological formations. Explore the trails on Street View, or fly across the vast national park in a helicopter with a famous nature photographer.

5. Nanyue King Mausoleum Museum in Guangzhou

Returning to Asia now, our first stop is the Nanyue King Mausoleum Museum in Guangzhou in Southern China. The museum was built at the site of the 2,000 year-old tomb of the Nanyue King Zhao Mo, the excavation of which uncovered thousands of relics in a 17,000 square meter area. Among the most prized artifacts are hundreds of delicate porcelain pillows from the Tang, Yuan and Ming Dynasties (618–1644 AD).

6. Claude Monet at The National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo

Next to Vincent van Gogh, Claude Monet is one of the Cultural Institute’s most viewed artists. You don’t have to go all the way to Paris to see his works; the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo houses a number of his paintings, twelve of which are on the Cultural Institute including one of his famous Waterlilies. The museum is Japan's only national institution devoted to western art, with pieces dating from the Renaissance to the early 20th century.

7. The Taj Mahal in Agra

There are few armchair travelers who aren’t already familiar with the Taj Mahal. But did you know that the Taj Mahal complex consists of more than just the white marble mausoleum? Explore the rest of the grounds on Street View within the Cultural Institute, including Darwaza-i rauza, or the Great Gate, and dive into the history and architecture of the complex in "The Wonder that is Taj" exhibit.

8. Angkor Wat in Siem Reap

Our last stop on this round-the-world trip takes us to the temple of Angkor Wat in Cambodia. It’s not easy to visualize what this 400 square kilometer archeological site looks like. So what better way to get a feel for it than through 3D images and animations from Monash University’s "Visualizing Angkor" project? Circle around a model of the temple grounds and its environs in the 13th century before diving into the history of the civilization of Angkor, which dominated mainland Southeast Asia for over 500 years.

Posted by Amit Sood, Director, Google Cultural Institute

Seeing smarter ways to sell opticals online

Friday, November 7, 2014

This post is part of our regular series of interviews with people across Asia-Pacific who’ve caught our eye, using the Internet to create, connect and grow.

Tony Zhuang of SmartBuyGlasses in China

How would you describe SmartBuyGlasses in one sentence?
SmartBuyGlasses is one of the world’s largest online eyewear stores offering customers a huge range of products, awesome prices, and superb expertise and service.

Why did you choose to go online?
Back in 2006, online shopping was just beginning to take off. More and more people started using eBay or Amazon to buy and sell, and the huge potential of the online marketplace intrigued me and my partners, Doron Kalinko and David Menning, so we decided to leap into e-commerce.

SmartBuyGlasses founders David Menning, Tony Zhuang and Doron Kalinko

Where did inspiration for your business come from?
We saw an opportunity around the difficulties people faced purchasing the perfect pair of glasses from their local optical store. Their choice seemed limited—either they couldn’t find the brand or the model they were looking for, or they could find the correct model but not the color they were after. Eight years ago, there weren’t many e-commerce companies specializing in eyewear and even fewer that offered a large range of glasses in terms of brand, design, color and size.

What has been your biggest challenge?
In a traditional shopping environment, retailers have the benefit of “facetime” to guide customers through the whole buying process, from answering questions, to letting them touch, feel and try the products. The big question for us was how could we replicate, or even beat, this experience on the web? With new technology and new ways of thinking, we believe that online stores can create a platform that enables customers to have the same or an even better shopping experience than offline.

Over the last 8 years, we’ve worked on many initiatives to give customers this better experience. We offer more than 180 brands and 80,000 SKUs—a range which no offline store can compete with. Just think of the storage space you need to house that many products! We continually optimize our websites with content, images, videos, improved product search functions, Virtual Try-On capabilities and much more in order to create a more fulfilling retail experience. We’ve also built a strong customer service team providing expert service through phone, email and live chat that can be reached 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Again, this is something that few offline retailers can rival.

With tools like Google AdWords and Analytics, we were able to boost traffic, sales and brand awareness, and therefore reach new customers in over 30 countries in just a few clicks. This would not have been possible offline without a significant investment.

What does the future hold for SmartBuyGlasses?
Moving forward, mobile commerce and online-to-offline (O2O) will be the two main areas of focus for us in order to continue pushing innovation in the optical industry. With a rapid increase in the use of tablets and smartphones, more and more people are browsing and shopping from mobile devices. How to deliver a first class shopping experience on mobile is a new challenge and even greater opportunity ahead of us. O2O is another initiative that is a key part of our future business plan. We would like to connect the online and offline markets utilizing new technology and innovative ways of thinking.

Posted by Tony Zhuang, CIO & Co-founder of SmartBuyGlasses, China

Bright side of the moon

Monday, September 8, 2014

Today is the Autumn Equinox, when the moon is said to be at its roundest and fullest, with millions of people here in Asia celebrating in various ways.

In Chinese tradition, Mid Autumn Festival, or 中秋節, is all about family, reunions, and of course, food. Children play with lanterns shaped like starfruit or rabbits, symbolizing the legendary jade rabbit which keeps the Chinese goddess Chang’e company on the moon, while families enjoy delicacies like mooncakes, persimmons, or dumplings that symbolize the sweetness of reunion. Today’s doodle running in Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, and Singapore depicts these cute bunnies on their journey to the lunar surface.

In Hong Kong, a traditional way to celebrate is with the Fire Dragon dance. Pokfulam Village is a place where this time honored tradition is held dear: villagers construct a long dragon out of hay, and parade it through the route as villagers adorn it with sticks of incense in a bid for prosperity. The Google Cultural Institute recently launched an exhibit about Pokfulam Village’s Fire Dragon dance—let the video carry you into the midst of the celebration’s noise and smoke.

Wherever you are, we hope you have a wonderful Mid Autumn Festival!

Posted by Wei Jiang, Head of Marketing, Google Greater China

Asia Pacific Blog