Google has long held close ties with politicians in Washington, D.C., and according to new data, nothing has changed. Watchdog group Campaign for Accountability has recently released new data detailing visits to the White House by various companies in the tech sector and other industries. According to the data, Google’s head of public policy Johanna Shelton has met with White House officials 128 times since President Obama took office in January of 2009.
It’s election season in India and Google is counting the votes. Not in an official capacity, but the tech giant is running a real-time tally of the numbers and placing them on an interactive map to keep track of the statistics on a regional scale. Whether you’re participating in the process as one of the election’s 500 million-plus voters, or you’re someone who follows global politics, this layout is a sight to behold.
To bring this project together, Google has leaned on Nielsen to help keep track of the results as they happen. The portal also provides fast access to each district’s local votes as they roll in, making it fairly easy to follow an entire nation’s transition of authority.
Google just gave itself a pat on the back by detailing how Google Consumer Surveys efficiently polls anonymous web users and helps to analyze voter preferences.
“So how’d you all do in your first election with us?” wrote Googler Brett Slatkin on the official Google Politics blog, “Pretty spectacularly.”
FiveThiryEight’s Nate Silver, a media-dubbed “high priest” of polling, called Google Consumer Surveys the “No. 1 most accurate poll online and the No. 2 most accurate poll overall,” according to Slatkin, while the Pew Research Center said Google’s surveys will “likely be an important addition to the research tool kit available to pollsters.”
The surveys run across the web and subsequently earn websites money for showing them, and web surfers can then anonymously submit their responses, and the cropped data gives publishers, such as Texas Tribune, Denver Post, etc., as well as political campaigns, academics, start-ups, and marketers, detailed research to better improve their products.
In related news, Google does more than collect data; the Internet giant also supplies it. Eric Hysen, of the Google Politics and Elections team, said the search engine saw “unprecedented digital engagement in this election on Google and across the web” during the 2012 U.S. Elections.
Previously only available to Egyptian users, Google launched (via Mashable) a new “Politics & Elections” landing page today for the United States – a day ahead of the Iowa Caucuses at Media Filing Center on Tuesday. The website acts as a hub to information on the 2012 elections, providing the ability to filter news articles and video by candidate or specific issues like the economy, immigration, or healthcare.
Clicking Trends gives you an interactive graph and timeline that charts trends for each candidate based on search volume, mentions in Google News articles, and views on YouTube channels. Clicking Play will let you watch how trends have changed for each candidate through the days, month, or years. The On the Ground tool provides a Google Map with links to election related events as shot by YouTube users.
According to Mashable, Google will also display content from the new website on large screens at the Iowa Caucuses on Tuesday. They will also be holding Google Plus hangouts live from the event.
