This Google Doodle Hits The Right Note

Wednesday, Nov. 12 marks Veterans Day in the United States of America — a day of shared appreciation for all those who have served in the armed forces, past and present. And as with so many holidays and special occasions, one of the world's biggest tech companies celebrated with a simple work of art. The Veterans Day Google Doodle went live on Wednesday, and it hits just the right note.

Google Doodles, if you're not aware, are the limited-time Google homepage images which sometimes pop up just above the search bar. There have been some really good ones lately — in particular, an awesome tribute to actress and inventor Hedy Lamarr. And the one Google rolled out for Veterans Day is lovely, too, showing a diverse array of veterans from the different branches of the armed services, rendered in a classic, appealing style.

You can't see it just anywhere, however — Google Doodles are often conditional on your location, because different countries have different holidays and events to recognize. For example, if you went to the Google homepage while in Poland, you wouldn't see anything about American veterans — today is their Independence Day.

The faces pictured across the front of the doodle represent veterans from each of the five branches of the U.S. military — the Army, the Air Force, the Marines, the Coast Guard, and the Navy. It also represents a diverse view of America's veterans, including two women and three people of color. This has inspired some glumly predictable racist backlash on the Internet, but truly, some things just aren't worth responding to.

In any case, whether you have any veterans in your life or not, be sure to pay your respects (here are some ways to be of use, for example). It's an enormous burden that they shoulder in service of the country, even more so nowadays in the post-draft era. The military is entirely made up of volunteers, which means the rest of us don't have to be entered into mandatory service. And the demands placed on service-members are great, especially throughout the last 15 years or so of military activity in the Middle East, as redeployments have surged. Suffice to say they deserve this day of recognition, and more, and it's good to see Google offer up a humble tribute.

Image: Google Doodle/Google