Google Project 10^100 update 'within a month'

Google is promising to shed light on its 'Project 10 to the 100th' competition — announced last year as part of its 10th anniversary celebration — within a month: or just in time for its 11th anniversary.

Project 10 to the 100th is an attempt to solicit ideas that will change the world, focusing on the notion that "new studies are reinforcing the simple wisdom that beyond a certain very basic level of material wealth, the only thing that increases individual happiness over time is helping other people", Google said when announcing the project last year.

Five projects will be selected to receive a total of $10m (£6m) in funding, but choosing those five projects has taken Google much longer than originally anticipated. The announcement of the finalists has already been delayed twice, most recently in March.

"We received over 150,000 ideas from users which far surpassed our expectations," said Jamie Wood, a Google spokesman. "We've never managed a project like this and it's taken much more time than we imagined to judge and sort through the ideas."

Wood promised that "within a month" Google would announce the next phase of the competition. That is likely to involve the release of 100 proposals for the public to vote on and choose 20 finalists, from which a Google board will choose the five winners.