Interview from the West Coast
Dean Laurence Simon on leave at Google Foundation

Professor Simon, on sabbatical this semester, is serving as Senior Advisor on Global Poverty to the new Google Foundation and Google.org. Reached in Mountain View, California, Dr. Simon was interviewed for the Global Alumni eNewsletter (GAeN).

GAeN: Most people know Google but not the Google Foundation. Is this new?
Simon: Yes, the two founders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, started a philanthropy called Google.org. The "dotorg" includes a traditionally organized foundation as well as an investment fund to further new technologies and enterprises consistent with the major social objectives of the dotorg.

GAeN: Have those objectives been identified?
Simon: Yes, in broad terms. We are working on global climate change and energy, global health, and global development.

GAeN: That is certainly a tall order! How will the dotorg approach climate?
Simon: The climate and energy team is already hard at work with the major goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and increasing the use of clean energy technologies. Their efforts have done much to accelerate the deployment of flex fuel, plug-in hybrid cars. They are also trying to influence and accelerate the adoption of federal climate change / energy policy and legislation.

GAeN: How about the health work?
Simon: The mission of the global public health team is to enable disease prevention and eradication in developing nations through better access and use of information. They are working with disaster planning and relief organizations to help them with their information technology needs, which often impose a major constraint on their ability to operate in emergencies. They are also working with humanitarian communities to customize Google products and tools for free distribution to enhance their effectiveness to contain and eradicate communicable diseases.

GAeN: And the world poverty agenda?
Simon: We have a global development team that is creating strategies for more equitable economic growth and to improve access and quality of essential services for the poor. We are in a quiet stage, intensively consulting with others and thinking through our strategies. Eventually we may have programs throughout the developing world, but we will probably focus much of our initial work in sub-Saharan Africa and in south Asia.

GAeN: What is it like to work at Google?
Simon: Well, it is quite a trip. The "Googleplex" is a fun environment with everything from a life-size dinosaur to a space ship. The food, all free, is extraordinary with real chefs preparing meals that could grace the finest restaurants. More importantly, there is also a deep sense of social mission that I would not expect to find in most corporations. Google takes very seriously its goal of organizing and making accessible the world's information.

GAeN: Hasn't that been the mission of libraries for hundreds of years?
Simon: Yes, but libraries, even the US Library of Congress, are limited by budgets, floor space, and the number of people who can visit. Google, as an extraordinary search engine for the internet, is not a library but it makes all libraries and all other digitized and specialized collections worldwide accessible. Think of how difficult it would be to sort through all that information, to find the proverbial needle in a haystack, without the algorithm that makes your search effective.

GAeN: How does that relate to our work at SID?
Simon: I believe poverty is about isolation and access to information empowers people. Yes, I know we have a lot of work to do to achieve literate communities linked to the internet. But as people and their organizations do come on-line it is like taking a donkey cart onto an airport runway and turning it into a super-sonic jet. The flow of information, the ability to network across all barriers, and the freedom to explore new ideas is phenomenal.

GAeN: How else?
Simon: Google's work is not just about the future, it is also helping to preserve the past through the book digitalization project. Agreements with major research libraries mean that much of the world's public domain, and even rare books, can be digitized for all generations to come. Tears came to my eyes when the importance of this project hit home for me. I was with an audience here describing my arrival in Sarajevo during the war in Bosnia in the early 1990s. On the way into the city from the UN airlift, I was taken to see the bombed out ruins of what had been one of the greatest and oldest Islamic libraries in the world. All had gone to ashes. If only Google had existed then!

GAeN: How old is Google?
Simon: It is still less than ten years old but has grown to be one of the largest corporations in history. Nevertheless, it is still a place where you can see the founders walking around in jeans and t-shirts, not waiting until they die to spread wealth and do good in the world. I'm impressed.

GAeN: It sounds like you are having a great time.
Simon: The chance to work with my old friend, Larry Brilliant, and to help in a modest way to shape the course of a great philanthropic effort, is phenomenal.

GAeN: Are you coming back?
Simon: But of course! We at Heller have built the largest international development program in the United States and my greatest joy is watching our graduate students from around the world enhance their skills as professionals. The community we have built is local and global at the same time. It is very much a rare privilege to be a part of it.