American Challenge for designing Google logo

In the past here at OSM, we have brought you many Google Doodles or the logo on their homepage, in relation to specific dates on the yearly calendar, for example it could be a date such as Halloween, Easter or an individual’s birthday. Examples of this have been escapologist Harry Houdini or inventor of the bunsen burner Robert Bunsen and what would have been his 200th birthday.

Today the news is a little different. Back in January, Google decided to run a competition “Doodle 4 Google U.S. open to American children which got them designing a unique logo for the search engine’s homepage. Plenty of youngsters took to their sketch pads and came up with some pretty impressive ideas, the challenge set was to draw something that related to “what they would like to do someday.”

Once the contest ended, judging was down to celebrity stars such as Whoopi Goldberg, creator of Garfield Jim Davis and so on. The prize for the lucky winner was a $15,000 college scholarship and a $25,000 technology grant for their school.


Mashable reported yesterday that the finalist was a boy by the name of Matteo Lopez who designed a space theme using an alien for the letter G, rocket for the letter L and so on. In addition to the logo, Lopez added “I want to wear a space suit, fly in space, walk on the moon and make friends with aliens (on) other planets.” Take a look above at the finished product.

If asked the same question what would you like to do someday, what would be your answer? Is there something that you have always wanted to do but never made the time or been brave enough to do it? Let us know.

Google makes their logo "speaking"

Google has put up a digital version of the legendary electric guitar, the Gibson Les Paul, in place of its logo to celebrate the 96th birthday of the country and jazz guitarist, songwriter and inventor, Lester William Polsfuss, better known as Les Paul.

The Google doodle in honour of Les Paul is playable by hovering the cursor over the doodle. Les Paul was known for his innovative and experimental guitar playing style.

Born on June 9, 1915 in Waukesha, Wisconsin, Les Paul developed an interest in music at the age of eight when he started to play the harmonica, followed by banjo and finally moved to the love of his life - the guitar.

He had formed his own Les Paul Trio in the 1930s and performed long with Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters in the 1940s. He also had his own radio program.

He designed a solid body electric guitar in 1941, but it finally went on sale by the Gibson Guitar Company in 1952. He also pioneered the development of multi-track recording and invented the eight-track tape recorder and the technique of overdubbing.

In 1988 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and in 2005 in the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

He continued to play and perform live well into his 90s. In 2006, aged 90, he won two Grammys. Les Paul died on August 12, 2009. He was 94.

Google has now become more frequent with animated and interactive doodles. Of the last 10 Google doodles, five included animations or were interactive.

The Google doodle had first gone interactive in May 2010 to celebrate the 30th birthday of the popular Pac-Man game.

For a dozen years, Google has been occasionally swapping its everyday logo for a doodle. The Google doodles, an artistic take on the Google logo, have gained immense popularity over the past few years and the Google doodle team has put out commemorative doodles on numerous events of international or national importance, ranging from news events, civic milestones, birthdays, death anniversaries and important dates in history. Google estimates it has created more than 900 doodles since 1998, with 270 of them running in 2010. Some appear globally, and others are tailored for local markets.