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Wong Chiu-yung, 17, won the Doodle 4 Google 2014 competition, landing her environmental design on Google's front page. Photo: David Wong

Hong Kong teenager's Google Doodle unveiled to millions on search site

If you boot up your computer today and search for something on the internet, the chances are you may stumble acorss the first ever 'Google Doodle' to be designed by a Hong Kong teenager.

Google

If you boot up your computer today and search for something on the internet, the chances are you may stumble acorss the first ever 'Google Doodle' to be designed by a Hong Kong teenager.

Seventeen-year-old Wong Chiu-yung became the first person in the city to have their own design featured on Google's homepage after winning the first competition of its type to be held in the city.

For 24 hours Wong's environmental design, where the word Google is spelled out using flowers, trees and water, will grace the homepage in place of Google's four-coloured logo.

Google Doodles celebrate holidays, well-known birthdays, anniversaries, achievements and major events such as soccer's World Cup.

Some can be played as games, others are interactive animations, some even work as musical instruments.

Wong's doodle illustrates the role of water. Photo: SMP
The first doodle was a burning man stick figure in 1998. Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page put the stick figure behind the second 'o' to let staff know they were at the Burning Man music and art festival in Nevada.

More than 2,000 doodles have been created since.

Wong's doodle was one of 3,500 submitted by young Hongkongers under Doodle 4 Google, a programme that invites students to submit designs. This was the first year the contest has been held in Hong Kong after running in the United States for seven years.

The theme was "If I was a green hero....''. and the brief was to come up with a doodle to highlight creative and innovative ideas for green solutions to the environmental challenges faced by the city and world.

"If I were a green hero I would live a green lifestyle. Water is a precious resource, as it sustains life and nourishes all that is on earth," wrote the 17-year-old student from Pok Oi Hospital Tang Pui King Memorial College.

The contest was judged based on three criteria: artistic merit, creativity and how well it communicated the theme.

The contest's theme inspired many young minds.

"One of the ideas was to send all the recycling to space, and use all the energy generated from the recycled materials to make soda for everyone," said Dominic Allon, managing director of Google Hong Kong.

One of the judges, Green Monday founder David Yeung, said Wong's doodle "expressed the theme creatively, emphasising the importance of water nourishing the earth".

"It is nicely spaced with a lot of artistic details," Yeung said.

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: HK teen's green Google doodle wins
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