Policy news @ Google Australia

Posted by Rob Shilkin, Head of Corporate Communications and Public Affairs

I wanted to update you with some great policy announcements that have been keeping us busy over the past week or so.

First, Google announced our plans to go carbon neutral worldwide by the end of 2007. You can read all about the specifics here. And you can see the video of the announcement on YouTube here.

In addition to taking part in this wide ranging global effort, Google Australia has an active self-powered commuting scheme. This scheme sees our employees rewarded for travelling to work by public transport or 'self-powered' means (such as bike, skateboard or walking) with a $100 donation to their chosen charity for every 20 days of participation.

Second, we launched a worldwide public policy blog here. This will be a great way to talk about many of the incredibly important and challenging global policy issues facing the internet - including privacy, child safety, copyright and content regulation. I really want to ensure that there are contributions by Google Australia to this forum, and would love you to post comments, as these issues affect our Australian users and the Australian community.

On that note, we have joined the Australian Information Industry Association (the Australian IT industry body) and are looking forward to very close involvement in their activities. Already, our Engineering Director, Alan Noble, has spoken at their events here and here and next week is speaking here. (In between this, and writing opinion pieces, I am assured that he does occasionally find time to work on Google products).

I'll post more updates on Google Australia policy news in future.