Like many people, Googlers Alan Mclean and Jennifer Daniel are navigating their new at-home lives, finding ways to work while also parenting their two young children. The couple are working from their home in the Bay Area, where they’re taking shifts parenting and creating a remote office from...wherever they can find some room. 

I recently had the chance to “sit down” (via Google Meet) with them and talk about our relationships with technology during stressful times, how they’re personally handling all the changes and also, why playing "Animal Crossing" is a totally acceptable coping mechanism.

Alan, you’re a Product Designer on the Digital Wellbeing team, and Jennifer, you’re the Creative Director for emoji. But how would you describe your job to someone who doesn’t work in tech?

Alan: There’s an official answer, which is “I help people balance their relationship with technology,” but…

Jennifer:????Ugh, corp speak!! ????What did you tell our neighbor?

Alan: I told him I’m trying to help people get more rest and have a healthier life. 

Jennifer: Yes! Hmm, for me I guess I usually say I make little smiley faces. :-)

What do your days right now look like? 

Alan: Typically the day before, we both check-in on our calendars and look to see where we might need coverage from the other. If we both have meetings, we’ll throw a tablet in our kids’ faces with a mix of educational (and not so educational) games. Lately our son has really taken to playing chess so he’ll practice digitally and we play together on a physical board. 

Jennifer: Our daughter enjoys the books that read out loud with her, and Toca Kitchen. They both love ”making food” that makes the characters get sick.

In terms of day to day, we divide and conquer by keeping it fluid. Sometimes I cover the morning routine which has settled into a relatively stable pattern now: breakfast, walk the dog with the kids, writing, reading and drawing time, punctuated with video meetings.

The afternoon, depending on our work schedule, includes science experiments (tin foil boats or paper airplane contests), some outside time, yoga (Cosmic Kids Yoga is great!), TV (Science Max is a hit), more tablet time and then dinner. 

Alan: I usually make up some work time in the evening once the kids go down.

What is your home office setup like? 

Alan:We live in a small home—950 square feet, two bedrooms—with twin 5-year-olds and an eight-month-old Husky puppy, so there isn’t much of an office. In general, we move around the house and try to be out of earshot. Sometimes I work in the kitchen, other times on our front steps, once from the kids’ bunk beds.

Are you able to create some work-home boundaries? 

Alan: Trying to avoid working where you sleep is a big one. Don’t do what we’re doing right now...which is working from bed. 

Jennifer:Sometimes that isn’t really possible. The bedrooms and bathroom are the only rooms with doors! For me, it’s less about creating a physical boundary and more about a mental one. I don’t work early in the morning or in the evening anymore. That’s MY TIME.

Alan: I think the challenge right now is that it’s hard to reinforce boundaries when you’re in the same place all the time. In the past we used context clues like walking to the bus or the BART or whatever, or there were subtle hints when a meeting was about to end. But you don’t really have that anymore. So trying to avoid working where you sleep…

Jennifer: But, I work from the bedroom, and I sleep in the bedroom. That works for me ????.

Working from bed works for you?

Jennifer: I’ve spent most of my life in small apartments, I guess I just got used to it? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Alan:I also think maybe the norms of what “balanced” means has changed. 

Jennifer:Yeah, just be forgiving of yourself. It took awhile but I really had to recalibrate and give myself permission to not live up to my previous expectations as an employee, as a mother and as a partner. I also have to make it clear to others to not expect the same out of me. As much as I try to project that I am fine, I am not fine.

I’ve personally seen my screen time and news consumption skyrocket; have you?

Alan:I’m definitely more of the news addict; I’m also lying in bed looking at an endless stream of things to worry about. I think a bit of an insight for me is that there’s a couple reasons why you might do that, and part of it is that you might want to feel some light version of control over what’s happening. And of course the net effect of that is that you might feel incredibly anxious. That’s my personal experience with screens lately. What about you, Jen, what about your doom-scrolling?

Jennifer:I love that you call it doom-scrolling, did you just make that up?

Alan:No, no, definitely not. 

Jennifer: Not to make this just about parenting, because this is also very much about work, but I am having flashbacks to new parenthood. When I became a parent, I got extremely efficient at my job. I don’t have time to doom-scroll! That would be a luxury! I have things to do, I got people to take care of. And, just as important now as it was then, I need to find time where no one needs me ????. These days I’m playing "Animal Crossing." And I love it; it is screen time, unquestionably, but it’s a very specific kind of screen time as it is clearly not work-related. Now that Alan mentions it, maybe playing video games is also an expression of seeking control and stability in an unknown time? But, instead of doom-scrolling I plant cute flowers and little animals come visit me ????????????????????????????.

What else are you adding to your routine? Anything else to help find some balance? 

Alan:For me, I know that the end of my day and the end of my use of my phone is occurring when I put a podcast on at night. Or ambient music. For me, that’s a really strong signal and I try to do it every night. For some people, that might be putting your phone in a box or charging it. I like the audio cue because that way you’re experiencing some stimulus without interacting with the screen. But I got that from Jen; I used to be like, “Why are you putting a podcast on at night? It’s time to go to bed… and doom-scroll for two hours.” 

Jennifer: I just listen to podcasts so I don't have to listen to my own thoughts as I fall asleep. Otherwise I'd be up all night ????.

The COVID-19 pandemic began spreading across Asia Pacific in January, affecting millions of people directly—and billions more through restrictions on the way we live and work and the impact on the regional economy. 

Throughout the region, we’ve seen people and businesses adapt with resilience, determination and ingenuity, including adopting and developing new technologies. Today, some parts of Asia Pacific are beginning to ease social distancing measures and restrictions on commerce—but we’re still many months away from anything like a return to normal. 

Google’s focus in Asia Pacific has been on three priorities: contributing to the immediate health response, helping people learn and work from home and supporting the small businesses most affected. We’ll continue to do all we can to help every part of the region get through, and we’re committed to being part of the economic recovery, so Asia Pacific can ultimately emerge stronger. 

Contributing to the health response

Since January, we’ve worked to share reliable information on Google Search and YouTube, support public health campaigns, inform health officials and curb misinformation. We’ve extended these global efforts with more targeted local initiatives around the region. 

In India, we’re helping female internet “saathis” (or trainers) share authoritative health advice with their networks in rural villages. In Korea, the Google News Initiative is offering weekly sessions training journalists on how to identify misinformation. In Japan, YouTube creator Hikakin interviewed the Governor of Tokyo to raise awareness of social distancing measures among his youth audience. 

We’re also helping Asia Pacific governments and institutions make the most of our tools to fight the virus directly. The Philippines’ government is centralizing health communications using an AI system powered by Google Cloud, Taiwan’s Digital Minister Audrey Tang has used Google APIs to create an app that tracks face-mask inventories, and we’ve worked with Singaporean nonprofit Better.sg to create translation tools for medical professionals caring for migrant workers. We started showing the locations of COVID-19 test centers on Google Maps, Search and Assistant in Indonesia, before extending the feature to other countries around the world, including India, Korea and the Philippines.

Alongside responding to the health crisis, we know we need to protect and support people who might be left isolated or vulnerable. Our team in India has helped local governments share the location of night and food shelters on Google Maps, while Southern Cross Care (SA, NT & VIC) Inc in Australia is using Meet to help aged care residents stay in touch with their families—two examples of how technology can help.   

Helping people work and learn from home

In many parts of Asia Pacific, people have been working and learning from home for months. Wherever possible, we’re adapting our global tools and resources to local needs—like giving 1.8 million students in the Jakarta region access to our G Suite for Education tools. We’ve launched local versions of our Teach from Home resource center—a partnership with UNESCO—across 13 Asia Pacific countries.

As teachers and students adjust, we’re seeing new approaches across the region. In Korea, public broadcaster EBS and the Ministry of Education are using YouTube to live-stream daily classes. In Malaysia, Google’s daily webinars for teachershave received more than 250,000 views. And in Australia, the inspirational Eddie Woo—a champion of teaching via YouTube—is sharing his experience and advice to help fellow teachers take their lessons online.   

Learners from disadvantaged backgrounds are more likely to have their schooling disrupted and their progress held back—so as part of Google.org’s $10 million Distance Learning Fund, we’re extending a $1 million grant to INCO. This funding will support nonprofits in mainland China, Indonesia, Hong Kong and the Philippines as they help underprivileged students with access to home learning. 

Supporting small businesses and helping local economies recover

COVID-19 has put many business owners under intense financial pressure, which is why we’re giving Asia Pacific businesses ad credits and other forms of support as part of a US$150 million commitment to the region. 

We want to make it as easy as possible for businesses to adopt new ways of working and manage through uncertainty—creating a dedicated website for Australian and New Zealand businesses, for example, or moving to an online format for Grow with Google skills courses like Indonesia’s Gapura Digital. We’re helping small businesses move their sales online and contribute to the recovery—like Yamaya, a Japanese sock manufacturer which is providing materials to help people make their own masks. And we’re working closely with nonprofits to help businesses most at risk from the economic downturn, including providing Google.org funding to help Youth Business International assist vulnerable small businesses and The Asia Foundation advance digital literacy in marginalized communities in Southeast Asia. 

Small businesses are an integral part of their communities, but they’re equally critical to economic growth, accounting for the vast majority of all businesses and up to 50 percent of GDP in most Asia Pacific countries. Just in the past few weeks, we’ve launched new programs supporting digital skills in Taiwan, developers in Korea and startups in Japan—and we’ll begin more initiatives like these in the coming months. Economic recovery will start locally and we want to be there to help.

In this global pandemic, everyone has a part to play. As Asia Pacific confronts the effects of COVID-19, we will continue to stand by the region’s people, business and communities for as long as it takes, and help rebuild when the time is right.

Since COVID-19 began, we’ve heard from our retail and brand manufacturing partners that they’re hungry for more insights on how consumer interests are changing, given fluctuations in consumer demand. We see these changes reflected in how people are searching on Google. Last month, there were spikes in search interest for household supplies and jigsaw puzzles as people spent more time at home. This month we’ve seen surging interest for sewing machines and baking materials in the U.S., and tetherball sets and chalk in the United Kingdom and Australia. 

Businesses are using a variety of resources to understand changing consumer interests—including Google Trends, social listening, surveys, and their own data—in order to help make decisions on the fly. But if they don’t know what to look for, there isn’t an easy way to understand which product categories are gaining in popularity, and might pose an opportunity.

That’s why we’re launching a rising retail categories tool on Think with Google. It surfaces fast-growing, product-related categories in Google Search, the locations where they’re growing, and the queries associated with them. This is the first time we’ve provided this type of insight on the product categories that people are searching for. 

When we previewed the data with a group of businesses, they had lots of creative ideas for how they might apply it—whether for content creation, promotional efforts, or even new products and services. Here were some of their ideas for how it could help:

• Content creation: A cookware company noticed that “flour” was a growing category in the United States. The team was inspired to explore partnering with a famous local chef to create engaging content about recipes that incorporate flour. 

• Promotion: A jewelry and accessories company noted rising interest in products in the “free weights” category, so the team thought they might partner with fitness influencers who could help promote their products. Similarly, an online business said it would regularly reference the data to inform which products to feature on its homepage throughout the pandemic. 

• Product ideas: An apparel company with a fast and flexible production model said its team would use this data to inspire new product line ideas.

For the next few months, we’ll update the tool with fresh data every day and hope this will help businesses of all sizes find new pockets of consumer interest. For additional resources and insights, sign up for the Think with Google newsletter. 

Artificial Intelligence systems can recognize our voices, forecast the weather and help decide who gets a loan. Given the increasing ubiquity of AI, it’s important that everyone is able to understand more about it.

Like any system or technology, AI doesn’t always get it right. And understanding why AI systems break is often not easy for people who aren't experts in the field; research results are shared in dense papers filled with formulas.

Of course, people who haven't studied AI still need to be able to ask critical questions about these systems. To help support these kinds of discussions, we've created AI Explorables, a series of interactive explanations of key AI concepts. They’re specifically geared toward non-experts (even though we think and hope that experts will also find them interesting and thought-provoking). 

The first two Explorables walk you through an assessment determining whether an AI system is fair and unbiased. Measuring Fairness weighs the trade-offs involved in building a machine that diagnoses a disease—and lets you try tuning it to be fairer.

In another Explorable, called Hidden Bias, we examine a system that predicts student's grades. Biased by the data it has learned from, the system predicts lower grades for women. Trying to fix this by hiding gender from the system doesn't always work (and, in some cases, can actually increase the bias in the system). 

In the coming months we plan on sharing more Explorables on other fairness issues (how do feedback loops affect the biases of an AI system?), interpretability (why did the AI system decide to do that?) and privacy (what does it mean in the context of an AI system?).

People and AI Research (PAIR) is committed to making machine learning more participatory, and we believe that Explorables will help expand the conversation around machine learning and make it more inclusive. You can find more updates about Explorables and our other work at the (new) PAIR Medium channel.

Tech Exchange is a student exchange program between Google and 11 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs). During the program, students spend a semester at Google’s Mountain View Campus, taking computer science courses and learning about professional development. With Tech Exchange students now learning from home, we brought in a speaker who has made a name for himself by engaging with people online: Hank Green, author and YouTube creator. 

Hank began his journey as a YouTube Creator in 2007 when he and his brother John decided to communicate with each other through video blogs every day for a year. As more people started watching the Vlogbrothers, Hank and John went on to create 32 YouTube channels including Crash Course and SciShow. In a virtual Q&A with Tech Exchange students, Hank shared his insights on how to build community online. Here’s what we learned.

Understand the problem that you’re trying to solve

Hank is often asked, “How does one become a YouTuber?” He says the first step is to understand the question you’re actually trying to solve. “Is it that I want to have a job where I get to be creative all day? Is it that I want to make a specific kind of content that I know is going to be high impact ? Is it that I want to have an audience or that I want to have influence?”

Once you actually know that answer, think about the first step on that path (this applies to content creation but also in everything in life!). It’s important to understand what tools you bring to the table. Put the problem that you’re trying to solve in a bucket with your tools and see what falls out. 

There are other people like you in the world, create for them.

Hank shared three strategies that he and John learned when building the Vlogbrothers community. The first is to find common values and interests. “You just have to say, ‘What is the stuff that I would like to see made in the world?’ There are other people who, it turns out, are somewhat like you in the world, and they will be there for it.” The second is to build a feeling of actual connection and the third piece is what I call the "touchstone," which is the YouTube creator building a relationship with the viewer. You have to make people feel like this person is worthy of being the nexus of a community.

Create content that represents various perspectives

Through Hank’s channels, he hopes to put out more content that is representative of a variety of voices and perspectives. To do this, he says you have to find hosts who don’t all look the same. But you have to go beyond that too, and give them full ownership of the creative process. The writing, the editing, the style need to be informed culturally all the way through. 

For more tips on building community, check out YouTube Creator Academy and Hank’s YouTube Channel, Vlogbrothers.