Google must really like kids because it looks like the company is going to be releasing another kid-friendly version of one of its apps. The first of these apps was YouTube Kids, a service which does pretty much what regular YouTube does except that it keeps everything at a PG level. If a recent job posting is anything to go by, Google Earth and Maps may be the next apps to receive the kid-friendly treatment, although I’m not sure what would have to be changed in order to do so.
Late last year, Google announced plans to make some of its most popular products more kid friendly. The company said it wants to revamp entities like YouTube and Chrome to be more “fun and safe for children” over the course of 2015. In February, it released its first new product: YouTube Kids, which CEO Susan Wojcicki recently said caused watch time for family-content videos to increase 80% faster than that of other clips. Now a recent job posting points to Geo products, like Maps and Earth, as one of the next targets for kid friendliness. Here’s the relevant part of the posting: “You will be the Product Counsel for a mixed portfolio of work across Geo and Google’s efforts to make our products more useful to kids. In this role, you’ll work with Product Managers, Engineers and other Geo Product Counsels on a variety of Geo consumer and developer products. You’ll work closely with teams from a wide range of product areas as they explore products designed to delight and enrich kids.”
