B Canel

Today, more than a billion people around the world begin observing the holy month of Ramadan, fasting from dawn to sunset, gathering with families and loved ones for meals, laughs and stories. Growing up, the best part about Ramadan was eating way too much lentil soup with my family and catching up on the latest episode of our favorite series, "Bab Al-Hara." Today, living more than 1900 miles away from my family, I rely on technology to get close with them during Ramadan. Whether it’s sharing moments on Hangouts, my sister sending me pictures of the iftar spread of the day, or receiving an avalanche of recipes from my mother for me to save and try out, technology helps us stay connected and celebrate Ramadan together even when away. In fact, technology helps more than 200 million Muslims living away from their families connect and share moments with loved ones. People look to Maps to navigate traffic and make it home from work for Iftar, download Google Play apps to plan ...

An onlooker then reported the mysterious appearance of the hole to a Coastguard near Orcombe Point. The National Maritime Operations Center immediately dispatched a team to cordon off the area for safety. The square cordon of 100 meters was placed around the snail-spewing hole measured at 15ft by 15ft (4.6m by 4.6m). Smaller holes were also starting to appear around the bigger, mysterious hole. A civil engineer from the East Devon District Council (EDDC) also arrived at the scene and thought it necessary to enlarge the cordon because of the possibility that the hole may have a chamber underneath, much larger than previously thought. The Coastguard team also noted that the sands around the big hole were soft. Devon is a coastal county known for its sandy beaches and wild moors. Popularly known for its surfing and outdoor activities, Devon is often visited by tourists and locals alike. The EDDC also speculated that the hole might have come about due to heavy rainfall t...

When Radames arrives, the Pharaoh gives him his daughter’s hand in marriage and heirdom to his throne. Now a large dose of plot thickener: Amneris comes to the banks of the Nile to prepare for her wedding. Aida follows secretly to get a last glimpse of her beloved. Her father sees her and persuades her to get from Radames the movements of his army. She does, then Amonasro steps out of the shadows to persuade the hero to join  his  army which, after all, consists entirely of freedom fighters who want to rule themselves. He also promises him Aida’s hand in marriage. Dazzled, Radames agrees. Alas, Amneris has been listening and denounces Radames as a traitor. The high priests condemn him to be buried alive. Amneris promises to get him pardoned if he will renounce Aida. No dice, he says, so it’s off to the tomb under the temple. Secretly, Aida has hidden herself there so they could die together. Duet: “The fatal stone closes over me. To die, so pure and lovely.”  Think o...

'Clarity of Vision' even when our lives and the world around us appear to be very busy and the cause of our distractions, we can still have a clear view... Lately I've gained much inspiration from "Random Encounters" This image was part of a series from the Shapeshifter promo shoot last spring for the Subsonic Festival more on that  http://www.orlandosydney.com/the-o-blog/28122014/shapeshifters-tribe-creative-body-painting. I had a second opportunity to photograph these incredible artists at the Subsonic Festival 2014 not only behind the scenes as they prepared the models but also for the parade late (read very dim light) on the Friday of the Festival. Applied by spray, brush, sponge and any manner of being creative with bodies and paint the ShapeShifters Tribe produce some top class work with models that really understand the importance of owning and working these eye catching designs. Even with the occasional rain shower this parade could not be m...

Pride is one of the world’s greatest celebrations of diversity, one that we’re excited to support every year. For 2015, we’re doing something a little different: we’ve created an online parade, #AndProud, so that people from around the world can celebrate Pride together. To join the global parade, visit Androidify , where you can create your own Android character with a fun new Pride wardrobe. During the weekend of June 27-28 your character will party side-by-side with others from around the world in the online parade. But the celebration doesn’t end there. While the virtual parade happens online, thousands of Googlers will hit the streets of San Francisco, London and New York to show their support in those citywide Pride festivals. Some of the best #AndProud characters will appear on big screens as part of Google’s pride floats in all three cities. From left to right, Sam Smith, Tom Daley and Jessie J celebrating the #AndProud parade In addition to #AndProud and our floats in SF, Lond...

Every journey we take on the web is unique. Yet looked at together, the questions and topics we search for can tell us a great deal about who we are and what we care about. That’s why today we're announcing the biggest expansion of Google Trends since 2012 . You can now find real-time data on everything from the FIFA scandal to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign kick-off , and get a sense of what stories people are searching for. Many of these changes are based on feedback we’ve collected through conversations with hundreds of journalists and others around the world—so whether you're a reporter, a researcher, or an armchair trend-tracker, the new site gives you a faster, deeper and more comprehensive view of our world through the lens of Google Search. Real-time data You can now explore minute-by-minute, real-time data behind the more than 100 billion searches that take place on Google every month, getting deeper into the topics you care about. During major events like the O...

LeBron and Steph. Marge and Homer. Matt and Sweat. These duos had people searching this week. Read on for more: Jailbreak Two prisoners made headlines this week after escaping from the Clinton Correctional Facility in upstate New York. People are coming to Google to learn how the two broke out of the prison and about the status of the manhunt, which is still ongoing. In addition to more than 100K searches each for [ prison escape ] and the facility itself , people are asking questions like “How often do prisoners escape?” and “How many prison escapes are there per year?” The incident has also sparked interest in other prison escape tales; search interest in “The Shawshank Redemption” spiked 8X in the past week. And in happier, more fictional prison news, Netflix dropped the third season of “ Orange is the New Black ” six hours early yesterday, leading to a jump of 500,000K searches for the hit show. High stakes Next, the NBA Finals are heating up as the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden...

As a kid, I spent hours on the living room couch playing video games with friends, taking turns trying to beat Ganon in "Ocarina of Time" and trading Pokémon until I had all 151. Soon controller passing and Game Boy link cables gave way to network multiplayer and PC LAN parties. Eventually, my living room became a virtual one, with a network of gamers sharing experiences and discoveries.  Today, the gaming world is much more diverse than the one I grew up with, and the community has created new formats that have made gaming more collaborative and interactive. On YouTube, gaming has spawned entirely new genres of videos, from let’s plays , walkthroughs , and speedruns to cooking and music videos . Now, it’s our turn to return the favor with something built just for gamers. This summer, we'll launch YouTube Gaming , a brand new app and website to keep you connected to the games, players, and culture that matter to you, with videos, live streams, and the biggest communi...

From a seriously groundbreaking “Vanity Fair” cover model to a sporting trifecta, see what the Internet was searching for this week. “Call me Caitlyn” Caitlyn Jenner topped the trends this week, with more than 10 million searches since she introduced herself to the world on Monday with a “Vanity Fair” cover story. Her high-profile transition has put Jenner at the center of an active national dialogue about transgender equality and rights. The news dominated headlines and news feeds for several days—in fact, searches for Jenner were nearly seven times higher than than searches for Kim Kardashian, who announced her second pregnancy with husband Kanye West over the weekend. Remembering Beau Biden Another well-known family shared the search spotlight this week, although for very different reasons. Beau Biden, Delaware attorney general and son of Vice President Joe Biden, died of brain cancer on May 30. Searches for news about his life and death topped 100,000 ahead of memorial services h...

There’s no question the world is wild about football. Last year, we watched in awe of the 2.1 billion search queries related to the World Cup. And regardless of whether it’s a tournament year, football (or soccer if you please) crushes the competition as the most-searched sport worldwide. But here’s something that surprised us: the world searches three times more for girls’ soccer (and football ) than for boys’ soccer—yet, only 1 percent of global searches for professional soccer are for women’s teams, while the other 99 percent are for men’s teams. That’s not for a lack of amazing performance on the field by women athletes—rather, it's because women’s sports have historically been paid less attention than men’s. For instance, women’s football was banned by the English FA (and other European organizations) until the 1970s, and it didn’t become an Olympic sport until 1996. We care deeply about inspiring the next generation of girls to become leaders—whether they’re in the techn...

We've all been there at some point or another… You just lost your phone and want to wipe your personal information. You attend an event, and you want to share your photos with some people (but not everyone). You hesitate as you download another app that's asking for a lot of information. Everyday, we make choices that affect our privacy and security online. Most people, however, don’t feel they have the right level of control to make these important decisions. According to a recent Pew study , 93 percent of people think it’s important to control access to their personal information, and 90 percent care about the type of information that’s collected about them. But only 9 percent feel they have “a lot” of control over it. We want to change that. Google builds simple, powerful privacy and security tools that keep your information safe and put you in control of it. At Google I/O, we announced that people will have more control over the information they provide to mobile apps in t...

From corruption charges rocking the football world to a 50-foot dinosaur, here’s a look at what everyone was searching this week: Deadly storms in Texas Widespread flooding caused by heavy rains in Texas and Oklahoma has left many dead, missing or unaccounted for, along with seriously damaged property and abandoned vehicles. With more severe weather predicted this weekend, cities across Texas topped the places searching for “storms,” with “How long does it take for streets to clear a flood?” and “where is it flooded in Houston” among the top storm-related questions. Soccer scandal Football’s governing body was in the search spotlight this week after the arrest of several FIFA officials in a dawn raid at a hotel in Zurich, Switzerland. There were more than half a million “FIFA” searches on Tuesday alone , with a top related question being the basic “What is FIFA?” (perhaps for those that call it “soccer”). Just as fans of “The Beautiful Game” span the globe, so do searches related to...

Every adventure starts somewhere, and YouTube’s began on Saturday, April 23, 2005, when "Me at the Zoo" became the first video uploaded to a new site no one had ever heard of. Captured at California's San Diego Zoo, the clip is a 19-second description of what exactly makes elephants so cool . Its brief runtime and casual setup suggest little of the online video craziness that would follow over the subsequent decade. But it turns out “Me at the Zoo” proved to be a simple distillation of the premise of the new platform, where anyone could just turn on a camera and broadcast themselves with ease. Who could have predicted that, in that same environment, new genres , new forms of expression , and new paths to stardom would evolve? That engaging and unique personalities borne of this place could be more influential than Hollywood's biggest names? Or that more than a billion people from all corners of the globe would come together in that space to experience what the wo...