Google announces two acquisitions today

Today Google made two pretty big acquisition announcements on their official blog.  Marissa Mayer tells us they acquired Gapminder's Trendalyzer software -- see it in action on the "Gapminder World" page hosted on Google's servers.  Together, these two companies will work together to present the world's data in ways that make complex and boring statistics interesting, and easy to comprehend.

"Gapminder and Google share an enthusiasm for technology that makes data easily accessible and understandable to the world. Gapminder’s Trendalyzer software unveils the beauty of statistics by converting boring numbers into enjoyable interactive animations. We believe that Google’s acquisition of Trendalyzer will speed up the achievement of this noble goal. Trendalyzer’s developers have left Gapminder to join Google in Mountain View, where Google intends to improve and scale up Trendalyzer, and make it freely available to those who seek access to statistics." -- Gapminder.org

Bernie Stolar announced the second acquisition of the day three hours later.  His announcement was about AdScape Media -- a company that delivers non-intrusive in-game advertisements.  The deal has been in the rumor mill since January , but now it is finally confirmed.  The official announcement on the AdScape Media webpage basically says "Yes we bought AdScape, but let's not talk about it".

Our charge at Adscape has always been to honor the game that was developed and find new ways to enable that game to continue so others can enjoy it. That's why we are so stoked to join Google—because these guys get it, and are committed to helping us continue our mission.