On Monday 21st November, Peter Barron, Vice President of Communications and Public Affairs for Europe, Middle East and Africa at Google, came to talk to the Sixth Form.

Before joining Google, Peter was editor of BBC2’s Newsnight from 2004-2008 and worked in TV News and Current Affairs for nearly twenty years. He has also been deputy editor at Channel 4 News and Tonight with Trevor McDonald and devised and edited the BBC Current Affairs drama-documentary series If…

Peter began the talk by discussing his tips for a successful career, whatever the field. He emphasised the importance of not necessarily accepting the status quo, but of challenging methods and ideas. He summarised this standpoint using his motto, ‘pizza is better without cheese’! In restaurants, Peter said, waiters were always surprised when he asked for a pizza without cheese, and assumed he had an intolerance or allergy, rather than believe that he just preferred it cheese-free. He used this example to demonstrate that people can be resistant to divergences from the norm, but that that should not stop you from pursuing your own ideas (or stop you from ordering a pizza just how you like it)!

Peter also discussed the growing importance of AI (Artificial Intelligance) in many areas of business and our day to day lives. He described the enormous progress being made at Google and other Tech firms in this field, as demonstrated by the impressive translation skills of Google Translate or the way in which Google Search can guess the end of your sentence before you even type it. To give the students a hands-on look at AI in action, Peter loaded up quickdraw.withgoogle.com, a programme which suggests an item for you to draw with your mouse (for example, a church, computer or even sea turtle) and then, using AI, proceeds to guess what you are drawing within 20 seconds. As more and more people use the website, its ability to recognise drawings grows. There was lots of laughter in the lecture theatre as the computer guessed what the girls were creating – often correctly, but just as often with hilarious results!

Overall, Peter’s talk was an engaging and informative look into the developments at Google, as well as his own experiences both at Google and the BBC. Many thanks to Peter for coming in.