
Google is FUBAR - llambda
http://www.extremetech.com/computing/115425-google-is-fubar
======
cheald
What strikes me the most about this whole debacle is that people have
complained for ages that Google doesn't "get" social. Its products have been
poorly integrated and incongruent. Then, when Google says "Okay, we're going
to integrate the balls off of everything, and provide a single consistent
experience across all our products", people pitch a fit. It seems they can't
win either way. This is a necessary step in fixing Google's broken approach to
social and personalized information.

Personally, I like this direction. I really don't care Google will have the my
same data in Picasa and Docs and Gmail. If anything, it's going to mean a
better product for me. It's not like Google is suddenly sharing all this data
with an external entity - it already had it. It already used it. Now it's just
using it across multiple facets rather than limiting it to a single one. I'm
just not sure I get the brouhaha. Maybe it's because I already use all those
services as a single user, and have wanted better integration between them, so
this just fits me better. Maybe I'm just ignorant about the implications. I'm
not sure.

I do have to ask, though - if you have an issue with Google's having access to
your data, why do you use Google services? As with any web property, if you're
in for a penny, you're in for a pound.

~~~
redthrowaway
> It seems they can't win either way

People like to bitch and gossip about whoever's on top. It's why celebrity
tabloids exist, it's perversely why shows like Jersey Shore and My Super Sweet
16 exist, it's why people complain about Apple or Google or Microsoft back in
the day.

Couple the innate tendency towards bitching with the prospect of ad revenue
from eyeballs, and you get the kind of tabloidy trash we've seen from
pandodaily et al. It's just people capitalizing on some of the seedier aspects
of human nature.

Google will survive this "controversy" (which 99.99% of its users haven't
heard of), just as it will endure the cyclic cries of "you're being evil!".
Sarah Lacy will continue to write sordid tales of no-goodery, and the Internet
will continue to lap it up. Bloggers will continue to seize on the latest
controversy to get pageviews, and so on.

> I do have to ask, though - if you have an issue with Google's having access
> to your data, why do you use Google services?

Because no one _does_ have a real issue with it. They might be bugged by the
abstract thought of it, but they certainly aren't bothered enough to do
anything. Empty words, floating on the wind...

~~~
mattmanser
Do you honestly think MS's actions didn't have serious consequences? Broken
companies, destroyed dreams, lack of progress? We're 5 or 6 years behind where
we should have been with the web because of them. And I still buy their stuff.
Good Guy Gates is a disturbing meme in my book, the greatest trick and all
that.

But on to my point, you must have an extremely short attention span, do you
not even remember what happened with Buzz? As it pretty much invalidates your
entire point.

That big BOOM, straight in their face. Happened pretty much exactly two years
ago?

People _do_ have issues with this stuff, if you don't, and I really mean this:

Shut up and sit down.

This is serious stuff, dangerous stuff, very, very, very dangerous stuff. You
don't get that. That Google engineer above doesn't get that, disingenuously
comparing fantastic user experiences with tracking you and invading your
privacy for better advertising.

The worst thing in life you can do is live in this little bubble of 'I don't
see the problem, I wish people would stop complaining'. If you don't, don't
assume it's because you know best. Learn from history, this kind of
consolidation of power is bad news.

 _First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't
a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I
wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak out because I was
Protestant.

Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me._

I'm not talking about people invading your home and sweeping you off into the
night tomorrow. But history has taught us time and time and time again that
there's every chance that'll be happening 20 years from now.

Maybe you think I'm being melodramatic, but it's the erosion between your life
and what any sort of organisation can easily take from you that has to be
continually fought, be it a government or corporation.

Just be glad there's people doing it for you. But _never_ compare it to
celebrity gossip.

EDIT: I feel a bit of a fool for posting this, but in the end it comes down to
this. If you knew that on average every 50 years the world get hit by
meteorites somewhere, you'd build a bomb shelter. No question. You'd take
precautions. We know that every few generations some force in power will go
crazy and do evil things. Giving them tools to seriously screw you up now when
they're not evil is not good forward planning.

~~~
hyperbovine
Thank you. I start to feel cold and lonely whenever I go more than a day
without seeing somebody trot out the old Father Niemuller quote for something
wildly mundane and less important than the Holocaust, and I think in this case
it had been two.

We're talking about Picasa having access to your address book (or whatever).
Get a freaking grip.

~~~
mattmanser
If by 'address book' you mean your searches, your email, your political
leaning, where you go, what you read, what time you're in the house, your
location, your sexual preferences, what you find funny, what you hate, who
you're fucking, who you hang out with, who you don't like, whether you do
drugs and everyone you've ever talked to then we have very different
definitions of address books.

~~~
redthrowaway
Again, if you don't feel comfortable with Google having that information,
_Don't give it to them_. They've always had the data; now they're saying
they'll use it. If the US Government went off the rails and decided to take
all of Google's data and track down dissidents, they would have been just as
capable of doing so before this update as after.

You're throwing out a lot of scary-sounding nonsense without saying why it's
bad. Sure, someone could use the information to do evil. Someone could also
use nuclear power to make a bomb. The problem is the bomb, not the power. If
your primary concern with Google is not that someone will use their
information maliciously, but rather that someone _could_ do so, you would be
far better off focusing your efforts on preventing the bad men from gaining
access to it.

Seriously, this what-ifery is why we have the TSA. Focus on the real threats,
not the hypothetical ones that could be realized if x, y, z, and z++ all
align.

------
spodek
It just occurred to me a main reason they chose "Don't be evil" as their
slogan. The foundation of the company is a slippery slope that will forever
motivate it to get more personal information and to do more with it --
generally meaning profiting from that personal information in ways people
don't know about. Also, they will forever be asked or demanded that
information from governments and other companies who want to do the same.

Many (most?) professions would never need to remind themselves not to "be
evil." Restaurants don't have to say "Don't be evil." Yes, they have the
motivation to skimp on quality or ingredients, but nothing like Google's
temptation. The company's foundation is so laden with temptation to "be evil"
it had to try to build defences to it in its core.

The problem with that situation is that the motivation never goes away, but
the effort to resist it can fade.

~~~
joebadmo
The real problem is people don't really understand the context of "Don't be
evil." If you read Steven Levy's _In the Plex_ , or any first-hand account,
really, you realize it's more about always thinking about the user experience
first. It has nothing to do with personal information. As far as I know, when
"Don't be evil" was coined, they used little to no personal information to
provide search results.

~~~
5l
I find it interesting that a motto so straight forward a child could
understand now requires knowledge of the context and history in which it was
coined in order to interpret it correctly.

From the Wikipedia article[0]:

 _Buchheit, the creator of Gmail, said he "wanted something that, once you put
it in there, would be hard to take out," adding that the slogan was "also a
bit of a jab at a lot of the other companies, especially our competitors, who
at the time, in our opinion, were kind of exploiting the users to some
extent."_

a letter from Google's founders:

 _"Don’t be evil. We believe strongly that in the long term, we will be better
served — as shareholders and in all other ways — by a company that does good
things for the world even if we forgo some short term gains."_

The intent seems quite straight forward to me, but if we're actually at the
stage where we're debating the meaning of "Don't be evil", then perhaps it's
already too late.

[0] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dont_be_evil>

~~~
joebadmo
Unfortunately, things like privacy policies and appropriate use of personal
information aren't as straightforward, even for children. "Theoretically,
there's no difference between theory and practice," right?

Also, if you think the concept of evil is easy or straightforward, well, let's
just say I'm a proponent of a broad liberal arts education.

~~~
5l
Nobody coerced them into any of this. The founders of Google can steer their
company in all sorts of directions.

If they choose to take their company to a place where they can no longer
easily discern 'evil' from 'not evil', then I think it's fair to say that
they're not adhering to the spirit of their motto.

To be honest, my main concern is that they seem to be driven primarily by
commercial considerations in dealing with Facebook, rather than serving their
users best interests. That, more than the specifics of what they're doing, is
what really worries me.

~~~
joebadmo
I'm not sure where coercion comes into it. I guess my point is that evil isn't
always easily discernible, and this is probably most true wrt the most
important subjects.

They said "Don't be evil," whereas you're interpreting that as "Don't ever
come close to doing anything that anyone could ever interpret as evil," which
I think is unfair and would be prohibitively restrictive.

It's a commercial company, so there will always be commercial considerations.
And I do understand the general unease around Google. But I also totally get
why Google would want to add social signals: to improve search. And if FB
won't open up, what alternative does Google have?

~~~
5l
> I'm not sure where coercion comes into it.

Sometimes you find yourself in a moral quandary through no fault of your own.

But if you're going to say, "I wont do evil" ( _whatever_ it is that you
actually mean by "evil"), it would be wise not to put yourself in a position
where you're either forced to do evil, or worse, can't tell if what you're
doing is evil or not.

> evil isn't always easily discernible

So you're right; it isn't always discernible, but that's no excuse for making
life even more difficult for yourself.

> They said "Don't be evil," whereas you're interpreting that as [...]

Not at all. They explained what they meant by it; I think it's perfectly
reasonable and understandable so that's what I will hold them to. Indeed, I
think it's clear that's _exactly what they wanted us to do_.

> I also totally get why Google would want to add social signals: to improve
> search.

Yes, I understand it too, and as I said elsewhere, I do find it rather
convenient. I wont pretend it doesn't improve search, because it does.

That said, I don't want Google locked in a race to the bottom with Facebook to
mine our personal data. I don't think it would serve any of us very well in
the long term even if it would improve our search results and Google's
profits.

> what alternative does Google have?

Find other ways to improve search.

~~~
joebadmo
> _...it would be wise not to put yourself in a position where you're either
> forced to do evil, or worse, can't tell if what you're doing is evil or
> not._

I think you're conflating two perspectives. While we as bystanders can parse
and decide whether what Google is doing is evil, this has no bearing on what
Google itself considers evil. If evilness is not readily discernable, then
there will be deviations between the two. But this doesn't mean that Google
itself is putting itself in a position to do evil. Why do you think Google
considers its actions evil? If you have some evidence about Google willfully
violating "Don't be evil," I'd be interested in seeing it.

> _So you're right; it isn't always discernible, but that's no excuse for
> making life even more difficult for yourself._

Making life difficult for yourself requires no excuse. If Google makes it hard
for itself not to do evil, but continues to not do evil, then there's
obviously no problem. If Google makes it hard, then does do evil, then it's
still the evil deed that's the problem, not having put itself in the
situation. So I find this whole "putting yourself in a hard situation" line to
be irrelevant.

> _That said, I don't want Google locked in a race to the bottom with Facebook
> to mine our personal data. I don't think it would serve any of us very well
> in the long term even if it would improve our search results and Google's
> profits._

I didn't realize that mining personal data counted as evil. If that's the
case, they crossed the line long ago, didn't they?

~~~
5l
> Why do you think Google considers its actions evil?

I don't want to sound prickly but you keep putting words in my mouth.

As I said, it's less about the specifics of what they're doing _now_ , and
more about the apparent switch of focus from "organising the world's
information" [0] to "deliver[ing] online experiences tailored to each
individual's interests and social circles" [1] which, I believe, may lead to a
bad outcome. And it's obvious many people within the company are uneasy about
this too (and do, arguably, think it's wrong) [2]

Does this mean "Google" thinks itself to be evil? Well it becomes meaningless
to talk about Google as a monolithic entity at that point because it's made up
of individuals.

I'm concerned because going forward I think it's going to be much harder for
Google to balance the best interests of their users with their mission and
profit motive. When Google launched, our interests were more or less perfectly
aligned with theirs. This switch in focus is one of the biggest upsets to that
yet.

> Making life difficult for yourself requires no excuse.

If I gave you my word, and then through a series of decisions proceeded to
make it almost impossible to keep it, perhaps you would say nothing all the
while. At the very least, I think you would have an opinion on it.

But here we have an institution. People build institutions. We can build it in
such a way that's it's likely to fail, or build it in such a way that it wont.
Surely you can see it's important to make it as easy as possible for Google to
do the right thing and difficult, if not impossible, for them do the wrong
things.

If we don't, I think history is pretty clear on this one. Sooner or later, a
bad outcome is _absolutely inevitable_.

> I didn't realize that mining personal data counted as evil.

I said _a race to the bottom in mining personal data_. Is what they're doing
now evil? The consensus seems to be, no. Is there a point where we could all
agree they've gone too far? Absolutely; obviously, even. So naturally you're
going to ask me where the line should be drawn. Well, I honestly don't know
and unfortunately I think we'll only know after it has been crossed, by which
time it may be far too late to take meaningful action.

Google doesn't need to go down this route. If they choose to they're going to
make it very difficult, if not impossible, to hold onto their values.

Me, I think there are plenty of other things they could be getting on with.
They haven't finished organising the worlds information yet. Maybe when
they've done that, we can talk again about them "deeply understanding" who I
am [1].

[0] <http://www.google.com/about/corporate/company/>

[1] [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/20/google-ceo-larry-
pa...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/20/google-ceo-larry-
page_n_1217379.html)

[2] [http://pandodaily.com/2012/01/24/larry-page-to-googlers-
if-y...](http://pandodaily.com/2012/01/24/larry-page-to-googlers-if-you-dont-
get-spyw-work-somewhere-else/)

~~~
joebadmo
First, I'm enjoying this discussion and I'm glad it remains civil. Thanks!

> _As I said, it's less about the specifics of what they're doing now, and
> more about the apparent switch of focus from "organising the world's
> information" [0] to "deliver[ing] online experiences tailored to each
> individual's interests and social circles"_

I don't see these as divergent. Information about individuals is information,
too, and needs to be organized. It also affects how the rest of the
information is organized.

> _And it's obvious many people within the company are uneasy about this too
> (and do, arguably, think it's wrong)_

> _Does this mean "Google" thinks itself to be evil? Well it becomes
> meaningless to talk about Google as a monolithic entity at that point
> because it's made up of individuals._

It also becomes meaningless to get that granular, doesn't it? Does Google have
to not be evil in the eyes of every one of its employees?

> _But here we have an institution. People build institutions. We can build it
> in such a way that's it's likely to fail, or build it in such a way that it
> wont. Surely you can see it's important to make it as easy as possible for
> Google to do the right thing and difficult, if not impossible, for them do
> the wrong things._

Could you describe in what ways you think Google is building an institution
that leads them inevitably toward doing evil? Maybe the part I don't
understand is what lies at the bottom of the personal data mine. Is it a
matter of _how much_ data they collect? What they do with the data?

~~~
5l
> First, I'm enjoying this discussion and I'm glad it remains civil. Thanks!

Yes, me too!

> I don't see these as divergent.

Not divergent in the sense that one precludes the other, but where one doesn't
involve me, the other is _all about me_. The old Google cared only about my
search terms, the new Google seems to want to climb in my bed with a notepad
and figure me all out.

> Does Google have to not be evil in the eyes of every one of its employees?

Google, the institution, just has not to be evil, as they have defined evil.
That there's obvious internal disquet about their new direction should be
fairly disqueting to you.

> Could you describe in what ways you think Google is building an institution
> that leads them inevitably toward doing evil?

It doesn't matter how many websites Google crawl or books they digitise, we
don't have to trust them or their intentions or any of their staff. But our
personal information can be used both for us and against us, and it's eventual
misuse is _inevitable_ whether by the institution, corrupt agents within it,
or parties outside of it. The only thing we can do is limit the potential
damage by limiting the data they hold on us.

> Maybe the part I don't understand is what lies at the bottom of the personal
> data mine.

That's part of the problem, I don't think anyone does really. We're in
uncharted territory and part of the reason it's so tricky is so much can be
inferred about you from seemingly innocuous data, or from analysing your
social graph.

> Is it a matter of how much data they collect? What they do with the data?

Well they have a loosely defined need which is pushing them to collect this
data. It _seems_ fairly benign; to improve search. But where does it end?
Larry Page doesn't seem to have drawn a line anywhere. Once they have the data
and it's been mined for further meaning, it's inevitable they'll find _new_
uses for it. So one leads to the other, leading back to the first.

Google is staffed by thousands of _very clever people_. I don't want them
spending their days trying to figure me out. They're not uncorruptible. It's
bad enough Facebook is at it; we really don't need Google _competing_ with
them in this endeavor. If we allow the situation to get out of hand, the
winner will be the company that holds the most complete portfolio of
information on us. Are you comfortable with that?

~~~
joebadmo
> _Google, the institution, just has not to be evil, as they have defined
> evil. That there's obvious internal disquet about their new direction should
> be fairly disqueting to you._

Could you point me to the obvious internal disquiet? Is this in reference to
Larry Page's supposed "ultimatum"? Because I was under the impression that
that was a simple expression of his commitment to his vision for the company,
misrepresented by a hostile media entity.

It seems to me that the bulk of your objection boils down to Google's
continued and expanding collection of personal data, and an impending but
vaguely characterized misuse of that data.

> _That's part of the problem, I don't think anyone does really. We're in
> uncharted territory and part of the reason it's so tricky is so much can be
> inferred about you from seemingly innocuous data, or from analysing your
> social graph._

I generally find warnings about vague, ill-defined threats to be unconvincing.

> _Once they have the data and it's been mined for further meaning, it's
> inevitable they'll find new uses for it._

This does not seem at all self-evident to me.

In fact, it seems to me that Google's incentives are such that it's pretty
much in their interest to use the data well. They have no incentive to sell
it, since it allows them to target search results and ads better. And they
have every incentive to keep their users' trust. And as far as I can tell,
they've taken the issue pretty seriously. The Google Buzz disclosure incident
is the only accidental exposure of information I can remember, and they
handled it pretty well.

~~~
5l
> Could you point me to the obvious internal disquiet?

It was to this [0] article I was referring. I don't think he was
misrepresented, but the Larry Page quote was really beside the point.

Edit: reworded the paragraphs below for clarity

> impending but vaguely characterized misuse of that data.

There have already been a number of occasions where either Google's network
was compromised [1], a rogue employee has misused data [2] or users have had
their accounts hacked [3] en masse. And of course, on top of this, various
government and intelligence agencies have had access to your data [4].

None of that should be the least bit shocking or surprising, because such
outcomes are inevitable when a large company holds so much data. I'm not going
to blame Google; none of those incidents served their interests and indeed
compared to most companies Google are unusually transparent and responsive
about these issues. But knowing that these things will happen regardless of
their good intentions, Google should seek to minimise and not maximise the
amount of data they hold on us.

> > Once they have the data and it's been mined for further meaning, it's
> inevitable they'll find new uses for it.

> This does not seem at all self-evident to me.

Perhaps I should have said, "it's inevitable they'll find new ways to make
money from it". They're a company, after all.

> In fact, it seems to me that Google's incentives are such that it's pretty
> much in their interest to use the data well. [...] And they have every
> incentive to keep their users' trust.

Well, we could say that about any company, and yet abuses occur regularly. If
you set a companies profit motive against the best interests of it's
customers, the cost of a breach of trust will simply be factored into the
equation. Unfortunately it is frequently the case that while a breach of trust
may be costly, it's not always costly enough.

I don't think there's _anything_ exceptional about Google here. They're not
immune to corruption. Google has served us so well so far because our
interests are aligned; it's the surest way to prevent an abuse of trust in the
future and why I'm so concerned about their new strategy.

[0] [http://pandodaily.com/2012/01/24/larry-page-to-googlers-
if-y...](http://pandodaily.com/2012/01/24/larry-page-to-googlers-if-you-dont-
get-spyw-work-somewhere-else/)

[1] [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2010/01...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2010/01/13/AR2010011300359.html)

[2]
[http://articles.businessinsider.com/2010-09-14/tech/29992918...](http://articles.businessinsider.com/2010-09-14/tech/29992918_1_google-
voice-google-engineer-google-accounts)

[3] [http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/jun/01/google-
hack...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/jun/01/google-hacking-
chinese-attack-gmail)

[4] <http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/governmentrequests/>

~~~
joebadmo
Let's leave the internal disquiet issue aside for now.

The occasions of Google's data being compromised are notable for being
exceptions, I think. Of course you're right that there's always the potential
for misuse, and the only way to avoid misuse completely is to never gather
data. It's parallel to the argument against big government. It's also parallel
to the argument against nuclear power. But in each of these cases it's a
matter of cost/benefit and risk analysis. You have to weight the risk and cost
of misuse against the benefit of Google having that data. It seems that you're
ok with the data Google has collected up til now, but you're worried about
more data collection in the future. That's valid, but to me the benefits far
outweigh the risk/cost.

Part of this is that Google's structured in such a way that its incentives are
to keep the data private (within its own network) because it makes money by
having sole proprietorship over it.

I think a salient distinction here is between privacy and confidentiality.
Google and Facebook both collect a lot of private information about their
users. But Google makes money by keeping that private data confidential, while
Facebook makes money by selling the data. These are the companies' respective
structural traits. And I think that's what makes Google unique.

> _Google has served us so well so far because our interests are aligned; it's
> the surest way to prevent an abuse of trust in the future and why I'm so
> concerned about their new strategy._

Can you elaborate as to how this new strategy no longer aligns our interests
with Google's?

~~~
nbm
> Google and Facebook both collect a lot of private information about their
> users. But Google makes money by keeping that private data confidential,
> while Facebook makes money by selling the data.

Facebook doesn't sell anyone's data. Facebook, like Google, allows advertisers
to target advertisements to a particular demographic of users without
divulging that user's identity or data.

(I work at Facebook.)

~~~
joebadmo
Thanks for the correction, I didn't know that. Is there somewhere in the
Facbook ToS that I can reference? I tried to find it, but couldn't.

~~~
nbm
You can read more about how ads work in non-legalese at:

    
    
        https://www.facebook.com/about/ads/
    

In non-legalese, how Facebook uses information it receives on users:

    
    
        https://www.facebook.com/about/privacy/your-info#howweuse
    

The actual data use policy:

    
    
        https://www.facebook.com/full_data_use_policy
    

The path to these last two - click "Privacy" at the bottom of a Facebook page.

------
Destroyer661
I have a hard time understanding the whole deal everyone is making of Google
finally combining the whole ecosystem they have into one nice package. I don't
think the author knows that Google already knows what you use in Google docs,
they already mine your email to show ads to you, they already do everything he
talks about, they're just now going to let you have access to it through
search instead of having to go to mail/reader/youtube/etc individually. This
seems like much ado about nothing. Google isn't trying to wall people up in
it's ecosystem, they're simply trying to unify all of the services they offer
into one point of contact, which, as a user of many of these services, I
applaud.

~~~
Ecio78
_they already mine your email to show ads to you, they already do everything
he talks about, they're just now going to let you have access to it through
search instead of having to go to mail/reader/youtube/etc individually_

Uhm ok tell me if you like this scenario:

* I'm fed up of my employeer so I'm sending tons of jobs applications from my personal gmail account

* I dont write these mails while at work, but sometimes I login on google services for doin some work-related stuff (let's say use keyword search tools)

* I forgot to logout

* I start searching stuff on the net with my chief for our vmware project and instantly google suggests me as a perfect match my application letter sent to vmware HR

* Thank you google I'm almost fired :)

of course in this case I should've logged out from google, but I'd prefer to
possibly opt-out this kind of stuff...

~~~
smspence
What you are scared of is some hypothetical situation that there so-far is no
evidence it could or would happen in the future? When you do web searches,
your personal emails start popping up within the results? That actually
happens, or is going to happen? When?

~~~
drhayes9
Relevant ads outed a gay teen on Facebook:
[http://unicornbooty.com/blog/2012/01/11/gay-teen-
inadvertent...](http://unicornbooty.com/blog/2012/01/11/gay-teen-
inadvertently-outed-by-facebook-targeted-ads/)

Maybe not widespread, but definitely not entirely hypothetical.

~~~
smspence
I'm not sure what this has to do with my question. What you linked to has
nothing to do with either Google or email.

~~~
drhayes9
>What you are scared of is some hypothetical situation that there so-far is no
evidence it could happen

Ecio78 outlined a scenario in which relevance targeting "outed" him in a way
he didn't want. I'm analogizing Facebook relevance ads with Gmail and search
ads.

I didn't think Ecio78 was saying that emails are going to pop up explictly,
only that Google would present information that is relevant to him in a
situation where he didn't want that relevant information.

------
cletus
Disclaimer: I am a Google engineer. These opinions are my own. Nothing I say
in any way represents the company's position, officially or unofficially.

That being said, I see all this as much ado about nothing.

Privacy policies are complex beasts governed by many regulatory environments.
Reducing a huge number of these policies to a handful, announcing it ahead of
time and giving you controls over privacy all seem like good things to me.

As far as SPYW goes, it's all about giving the users more relevant results.
This is something you can opt out of (to some extent with privacy controls,
otherwise with logging out).

To me this seems to be another of these "bubble" issues.

Take Apple as an example of that. Every time they release a new (iPhone, iPad,
whatever) you'll see people in the tech bubble (largely of SF and NYC) dig up
tired old cliches like "its evolutionary not revolutionary" (seriously, I'm
_so_ sick of hearing that phrase) and it's "not the upgrade I was hoping for".
On HN you'll find people who are still somehow shocked that you can't out-of-
the-box sideload a bootloader onto an iPhone (or whatever).

Consumers (outside the bubble) however _love_ these new products. Just look at
Apple's 2011Q4 results, which are simply _astounding_. Thing is, that happens
_every_ time and yet the same old jaded "bubblistas" meet every new release
with the same mix of lukewarm cliches, disappointment and derision.

I see this as much the same way. All of this is about (IMHO) improving the
user experience. You don't have to look very far to see accounts from users
who love these new features.

If we know something of your interests (based on G+ and/or search), isn't
suggesting more relevant content to you on Youtube (as a purely hypothetical
example) a good thing?

EDIT: as far as including Twitter/FB goes, Eric Schmidt addressed this [1]:

> I countered that Google seemed to have all the permission it needed, in that
> they’re not blocked from crawling pages.

> “That’s your opinion,” Schmidt said, then joked: “If you could arrange a
> letter from Facebook and Twitter to us, that would be helpful.”

> I pushed back that both have effectively given those letters since their
> robots.txt files — a method of blocking search engines — weren’t telling
> Google to go away.

> “That’s your interpretation of their policies,” Schmidt said.

[1]: [http://marketingland.com/schmidt-google-not-favored-happy-
to...](http://marketingland.com/schmidt-google-not-favored-happy-to-talk-
twitter-facebook-integration-3151)

~~~
bambax
> _If we know something of your interests (based on G+ and/or search), isn't
> suggesting more relevant content to you on Youtube (as a purely hypothetical
> example) a good thing?_

No, it's not. Not because of "privacy" concerns or this whole silly "evil"
debate, but because YOU'LL GUESS WRONG.

I have many interests.

I never email anyone about my search queries because I do searches about
programming, and I exchange mail with my friends about past or future parties.
If you try to use one to help the other you will produce a soup of irrelevant
garbage.

Please just show me the most relevant links in the whole Web. I don't care
what my friends think (I know already).

~~~
mvgoogler
_"just show me the most relevant links"_

Here's the rub - for a given query there is no such thing as _the_ list of
link that are "most relevant". Different people will have (potentially widely)
divergent opinions on what the most relevant set of links are _for the exact
same query_.

The goal Google web-search [1] is to show _you_ the links from the whole web
that are most relevant to _you_. Knowing more about you allows a search engine
to make better decisions about what links are relevant to you.

You would be hard pressed to find an engineer at Google that thinks search is
remotely close to a "solved" problem.

([1] for the cynics - yes, Google makes a lot of money from showing ads on
search result pages. That is a nice effect of having a great search engine.
Making money isn't the _goal_ of web-search. Showing relevant results is. That
was true when Larry and Sergey were cobbling together machines in their dorm
room. It is still true today)

~~~
jcrites
Here is a concrete example. A few days ago I visited Google and, rather
tentatively, typed in the word "ring".

I was expecting to get garbage pages about wedding rings, or something like
that. As its #1 result, Google sent me where I had wanted to go:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_(mathematics)>

By knowing my interests lie in computer science, technology, and mathematics,
Google was able to return this for me as the first result.

Other searches my friends did took them to rings for sale on Overstock.com or
Amazon.

I welcome this new technology.

~~~
klheyman
But your own example implies that you could've achieved the same results by
simply using the "and" operator: ring AND mathematics. No reason to give up
privacy.

I'm actually surprised that your friends didn't get the Wikipedia entry on
"ring" among their top results. When I ran the search on both Google and Bing,
it came up second.

------
bambax
> _Nothing happens on an Apple device without Cupertino’s knowledge, and as a
> result Apple can perfectly tailor its devices for it users (and ratchet up
> record-breaking quarterly earnings in the process)._

Are Apple's devices "perfectly tailored for it[s] users"? I don't see any of
that tailoring when I use them.

The reason why Apple _ratchets up record-breaking earnings_ is that they build
things people want; they build incredibly good devices.

Google is playing with fire; the thing it has that people want is not G+ or
Reader or even Gmail: it is search. If they break search, they will die.

~~~
rbanffy
OTOH, we might discover adding a social dimension to search results may yield
better results for a substantial chunk of the general population. If I am
looking for a how-to, knowing whether my geek friends found it useful would be
a good indicator.

It has to be carefully balanced to avoid forming social echo chambers and
perpetuating instantaneous events, but, in the end, it may prove useful.

And it's a bit of exaggeration when people gets worried about privacy when
they voluntarily submit the data to the very machines they fear.

~~~
GoCatGo
> And it's a bit of exaggeration when people gets worried about privacy when
> they voluntarily submit the data to the very machines they fear. Don

While a valid point, I signed up to g+ and then logged out permanently as I
didn't want all my data submitted to a single company (i.e. Google has my
search, calendar and gmail) I don't like that they have so much in one spot
already but I certainly wasn't going to give them social as well.

I think that everyone likes to have an element of anonymity online and this
lets Google have a much clearer idea of the kind of person you are by tying
these together.

While we on HN might be clever ones that realise all the data we're putting
out there there's a whole world of lay people that have no idea. I assume the
outrage isn't so much about the people in the know, but about your grandmother
not realising what she's volunteering.

~~~
bytefactory
I can't believe people are making such a fuss about a non-issue. Google isn't
being 'evil' by aggregating data from all its properties. I'm surprised they
hadn't been doing this already!

Think about it. If you owned Facebook and Microsoft, wouldn't you want to co-
relate the data in Facebook with Windows? For example, to see how many users
of Windows 7 use Facebook, and how it affects bounce rates? Do you think
companies don't already do this (Bing and Microsoft, Safari and iTunes, etc.)?

Do you think Google ALREADY wasn't co-relating data from its different
properties? And what exactly is wrong with that anyways? You'd have to be
pretty naive (and unreasonable) to expect a parent company not to have access
to data from all its subsidiary operations. How does one "opt-out" of letting
Windows co-relate data with Internet Explorer, short of just not using one of
them?

Have you ever tried visiting <https://www.google.com/dashboard/>? This page
shows you all the accounts and information Google associates with your
account. This was always the case. All that's changed is that the privacy
policies associated with all of these disparate accounts have been combined
and simplified.

You CAN opt-out of the Google tracking for ads here:
<http://www.google.com/privacy/ads/> I've known about this option for ages but
haven't used it, simply because I respect Google's approach here. I'd like to
see Facebook offer a similar option.

You can also see the profile Google has collected about you here:
<https://www.google.com/settings/ads/onweb/> as well as opting out of
personalization.

Does this really seem evil to you?

~~~
Drbble
You are conflating "evil" with "unprofitable" and obviously missing the point
as a result.

Also, you can opt out of ad targeting, not tracking. Huge difference.

------
victork2
I feel like there are many Google supporters here but to be honest Google is
steering to a bad direction if you are like me about efficiency and relevancy.

What makes me mad is that we don't have the choice. I don't want all the
social bullshit, the +1, why would I even give a crap about that? I don't want
to have everything interconnected, I hate the fact that now if I logged in to
Gmail I am logged into Youtube. I don't buy Apple to avoid fully integrated
systems, I will not use Google in the future.

It makes me think about CNN who believes they are more relevant when they are
reading what shit people say on Twitter "Ze pope is dead LOL". Yeah right,
great piece of info here.

But hey, if people like it, they are welcome to it, I just hope there will be
good alternatives in the future.

~~~
Karunamon
>What makes me mad is that we don't have the choice.

If you don't like the social results in your SERP, you realize it's a one
click button to turn it off, right?

Or were you talking about the +1? Nobody forces you to click on it.

I don't get the rage. Google owns a multitude of different sites. Being able
to sign into all of them at once is a godsend as far as I'm concerned.

So much misplaced anger here..

~~~
victork2
Au contraire I don't have any anger. If their choice is to sacrifice relevancy
for their other social services or they social bullshit, it is fine with me, I
am not a fan of Google brand, just a user and I will take my business
elsewhere.

To tell you where the problems come from in my opinion:

_ Everything is opt-out, not opt-in. After I realize than I am very pro-choice
in term of user experience.

_ The +1 thingy is very tricky, if you click the wrong button and don't read
well, that's it you're on +1. And once you're on it, no way to get out

_ Relevancy is killed by the influence of +1. Look at this talk if you have
the time:
[http://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bu...](http://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bubbles.html)
. Since it is an opt out 99% of the user won't do it and in the long term it
will probably have a bad influence on how people receive and perceive
information.

I think my reasons to leave are relevant and not based on rage but a cold
appreciation of the future of Google.

~~~
tonfa
> in the long term it will probably have a bad influence on how people receive
> and perceive information.

I would expect people doing web ranking in a search engine company to be aware
of the "online filter bubble" phenomena. So in the longer term I hope it would
be a signal used in ranking among many other (and see no reason why it
couldn't be that way).

------
SoftwareMaven
Assuming this article's suppositions are correct (that Google must become more
social to continue growing), Google is showing a lot of _cojones_. Most
businesses won't cannibalize their core cash-cow, even when they know the
future is limited (see Kodak with digital cameras and every hard disk
manufacturer :). There is no question it is a gamble; but if the other option
is an eventual sunset (and I wouldn't be surprised if Larry thought of it that
way), it is better to make the bet while you are on top than when you are
scratching for survival.

~~~
smspence
I don't understand. Can you please explain how they are "cannibalizing their
core cash-cow"? Can you please explain what they are gambling or betting on?
They aren't getting rid of search as we know it. They are just adding
additional features. They haven't taken anything away.

------
gdubs
Here's something I've been concerned about... I do Core Audio development, and
participate from time to time in the Apple Core Audio Mailing list. Every so
often a newcomer will arrive and ask about something basic. In response,
someone will tell them to google it. This is common in coding related mailing
list circles: "I just googled it and the answer is the third result down".
Now, my concern is that the google results an advanced user will get are going
to be more relevant a lot of times than what a newcomer – who hasn't done a
whole lot of Core Audio yet – will see. They're likely to get hundreds of
pages of results that mask what they're looking for, because to Google they're
not a low-level audio programmer, so they're probably looking for something
else. I realize it's a bit of a slippery slope argument, but something about
different-search-results-for-different-people that bothers me – maybe its the
fact that so many people aren't even aware that their google results may be
drastically different from others. To me, it has a lot to do with what
Nicholas Negroponte called "The Daily Me".

------
protomyth
As much as I love my parents and my close friends, I really, really don't want
their postings or links to influence searches I do. They, as a whole, are not
relevant to any search I have done in the last year.

On twitter, I follow a lot of area experts and could be relevant in those
specific areas, but many of them have wider interests. Some of these interests
would negatively influence the search I do.

I really wish they would concentrate on customer service (human) and dealing
with the spam links and implications of the must-post-first journalism model
that is a basic creation of their payment model.

------
ck2
DuckDuckGo was really ahead of the curve with the privacy angle eh?

Now if they just had their own crawlers - I keep saying they need to merge
with Gigablast (Matt Wells) which was the most promising startup a decade ago
and looked like the old google pre-adsense, but never took off (built his own
crawlers way before "the cloud" existed).

------
icebraining
_And of course, the kicker: Google’s ad networks — AdSense, AdWords,
DoubleClick — will have full access to all of your search and surf habits from
every Google web service._

They already did. Hell, we've had this discussion eight years ago [1] when
they announced Gmail, which mines your email for demographic data to show you
ads. Nothing has meaningfully changed in that respect.

[1]: <https://www.privacyrights.org/ar/GmailLetter.htm>

------
mkup
I've been using "GMail for Domains" service for years to filter spam. Can
anyone recommend a viable alternative?

I read e-mail in Portable Thunderbird, it's downloaded/uploaded via POP3/SMTP,
so I don't have to browse the internet with Google cookies. Also I don't have
Google+ account, and I have separate browser to access Analytics and Webmaster
tools and AdWords. My main browser clears all cookies at end-of-session except
ones from whitelisted domains, so I'm not bothered by the search query spying
that much. They can bind search queries to my e-mail account only by the same
IP address used in HTTP search and POP3/SMTP mail transfer.

One more question: does Chrome browser (on desktop) have some kind of builtin
instance/installation ID it transfers to Google servers every time I connect?
I use Firefox, but anyway.

~~~
freehunter
People love Google services, but they don't like the very things that make
those services great. Without knowing who you are and what you're about, they
can't accurately filter spam or show you relevant results/ads. There are other
spam filters, but they don't work as well because they don't know you.

Yes, Chrome sends information back to Google just like Google Search does: it
tracks what searches you make through the Omnibar. Firefox does the same thing
when you make Google searches in their search box.

~~~
mkup
Filtering spam has nothing to do with my search queries. It's all about
finding duplicate or nearly duplicate messages sent to many people at once,
all one needs is a large sample database.

~~~
freehunter
Which is when you get false positives, about the worst thing a spam filter can
do. Millions of legitimate organizations send billions of duplicate messages
per week. And what's spam for you might not be spam in my eyes. Or maybe it's
just a case of needing to unsubscribe from the mailing list. Maybe there's a
phishing message and a legitimate message coming in at the same time. Your
spam filter needs to know which one is which, it needs to be quick to react to
new developments, and it needs to know what you want to see and what you
don't.

Spam filtering is hard. Gmail got popular because of their space and their
nearly bullet-proof spam detection. If it was easy, someone else would have
done it.

------
njloof
"... there is no option for you to continue using the old privacy policy that
existed when you signed up."

Find me one web site that allows me to continue using their expired privacy
policy in perpetuity.

------
jfeldstein2
Seems to me google search results are the same as ever, they just put a G+
widget on the side and Twitter and Facebook peeps are upset they weren't
included so they're calling it "evil".

~~~
SquareWheel
It's also including Google+ pages in suggested search, and seems to prioritize
those pages in organic search too.

I don't have an opinion of if it's evil, but I think it is more than just the
sidebar.

------
jrockway
So, this was all true before the privacy policy change. Google isn't asking
for new rights, they just condensed 70 documents into one.

~~~
smspence
Facts and logic are not going to stop the bloggers from creating FUD and link
bait.

------
MCompeau
I'm really surprised that Google is moving towards a more
integrated/proprietary/closed platform. Their advantage was always that they
were able to make the chaos of the web sensible to navigate. As a trendsetter
in terms of openness they were protecting their own best interests by
influencing others to be open (and thus crawlable) as well. I guess Google has
decided that the content stored in the walled gardens of other platforms
(Facebook) has become so valuable that they must change their own approach in
order to compete.

~~~
myko
What do you mean by Google is moving towards a closed platform?

~~~
MCompeau
I mean it in a colloquial sense. By tightly integrating their services and
beginning to aggregate primarily their own content through search it seems
they are taking a protectionist stance.

~~~
laconian
You are talking about Facebook and Twitter, right?

------
tehwalrus
I don't want search results tailored to my google profile, I want the real
results, even if I disagree with them.

Example: I found my blog coming higher and higher on google for random search
terms...only to realise that I was logged in and google knew that it was my
blog. Not useful data!

I would move to duckduckgo, if it weren't mediocre the last time I tried.
Maybe it's time to give them another shot.

~~~
latch
Speed is the biggest problem with DDG, but really, there's no harm in giving
it another shot for a couple days to see how it has improved (because it has).

------
yaix
"It must force [...] Google+ down the throats of users who are simply looking
for a brilliant search engine."

And that's the part I don't get. Facebook does not even make that much money.
Why would Google want to be more like it?

Google is leading the part of the web with most profits. And now tries hard to
abandon it in favor of becoming second in the part that makes one of the worst
profits. Why?

------
a_a_r_o_n
SPYW is Spy World. The hilarious part is that I didn't even have to bring in
my own words. SPY is right there, dominating the word and guiding the way you
would attempt to pronounce it, and World is what the W actually stands for.

Spy World. _What_ were they thinking?

------
api
There are "wheels of reincarnation" in computing:
[http://www.retrologic.com/jargon/W/wheel-of-
reincarnation.ht...](http://www.retrologic.com/jargon/W/wheel-of-
reincarnation.html)

One of these is the PC/mainframe decentralization/centralization cycle. Right
now we're completing as swing back from decentralized PCs to centralized
mainframes, except now the latter is called "cloud" and "software as a
service."

I think it's time for the pendulum to start swinging the other way.

What we need are software platforms for large-scale, secure, reliable
decentralized computing over wide area networks. Then we need to use these to
enable decentralized meshed Facebook, Google, etc. competitors.

------
AJ007
My Gmail account is accessed separately on a remote machine. Its not my main
email account. I have no "Google" account, because I do not use Google in that
context.

I don't use Google Docs, Google Reader, or log in to Youtube to watch videos
marked as offensive.

Use Google for search. Certainly don't use a Google linked version of Android.
There are plenty of good alternatives to most everything Google has.

The aggressiveness of Google's actions make me think a launch of a Facebook ad
network is imminent, just in time for their IPO.

------
danso
This is why I use two different browsers. My main browser, Chrome, is where
I'm logged onto my GMail account. I use another browser solely to connect to
Facebook so that it doesn't collect my Chrome's site usage data.

Also, I think I've always assumed that everything I've entered in Google
Search will be linked to me indefinitely...so...sensitive searches are done in
the non-logged in browser.

Of course, there's IP tracking, but I'm not feeling that paranoid yet.

------
dools
_Personally, I thought Google already did this_

Me too. I assumed that since they all share a cookie/login that this is why
they bothered to have so many different services.

------
beloch
Am I the only one who has started running Gmail and Facebook in their own
separately installed browsers that are used for absolutely nothing else?

------
laconian
This trope is getting super-tired. We even heard from someone saying that
Google reducing the stock of bagels in the snack bars is _EVIL!_

------
mburst
I think the whole idea of a search engine is to give you relevant results.
Google already does this and you can view your current ad profile here
<http://www.google.com/settings/ads/> I think it makes sense to combine all of
their products, though taking input from my e-mails seems a bit shady.

------
dedward
All other facts aside, I sort of assume google analyzes their statistics to
find out what works and what doesn't... whether an extra quarter second of
search results matter or not, and so on.

I don't like the confusing mess it's become either... I use a bunch of
products, and I kept them compartmentalized for my reasons, mostly just
simplicity. Now it's this big mess that I could go ranting about.....

That said - just because people say they don't/won't like something doesn't
mean it won't be liked/loved, and used by everyone. The end users actions
speak louder than their words, and on the internet, this is easy to watch.

As a 20 year veteran of the internet and all that crap? Sure. Am I frustrated
by Google's current direction? Yup...

Will I stop using it? I haven't yet - we'll see, but if I do, it will only be
because I naturally move to something else because google stops being as
useful.... and that's how the majority of people react to things. (Then I
wonder, if I find it confusing, how will my mom find it?)

------
tatsuke95
>"According to Pando Daily..."

Who used completely unattributed sources ("X-Googlers") themselves. That's
textbook _echo chamber_ in action.

------
toddh
It's a more successful version of the Yahoo portal strategy + the walled
garden strategy. Yahoo failed when the competition created more attractive
services and a walled garden requires something interesting enough to build a
wall around. It will interesting to see how well it works.

------
trotsky
Is it really true that there hasn't been co-mingling of user data between
properties already? It seems hard to believe that most user data didn't at
least "leak" into their advertising businesses, which presumably is where
you'd be worried about it going.

------
wiggum
The solution is to log out. For those of you who like being signed into Gmail
put "accounts.youtube.com" in your adblock filters. That will prevent Google
from automatically signing you in to Youtube and other services.

~~~
cdh
Just because you've logged out of a site doesn't necessarily mean the cookies
have been deleted. Google can still track you just as effectively until you've
cleared your cookies. In fact, if they store IP address and useragent
information, they could continue tracking you even afterwards.

Now, I don't know that they do that, but they certainly have the technical
means to do so.

~~~
dereferenced2
Pretty sure they do. Watch this ted talk about filter bubbling from last year:
<http://www.thefilterbubble.com/ted-talk>

He mentions they use ~30 points of info to identify you, even if you're logged
out.

~~~
tonfa
From the talk:

> Even if you're logged out, one engineer told me, there are 57 signals that
> Google looks at -- everything from what kind of computer you're on to what
> kind of browser you're using to where you're located -- that it uses to
> personally tailor your query results.

He says they are signals used during ranking, not something to identify
people.

------
EGreg
I remember when Facebook introduced the newsfeed, everyone was up in arms.

But this is more like when Facebook saw Twitter's growth numbers and got
scared and decided to be more like it. So a private social network became more
public and everyone (including Google) could link to it now.

It's a sad day when a company abandones what it has come to represent, and
becomes something else.

But then again, if you want to use your own stuff, it's always there. You can
always host your own applications! Wordpress instead of blogger. Your own
email. This has always been possible.

Relying on centralized authorities you have to accept that this might happen.

------
kr1shna
I don't understand what all the fuss is about. I bet most users go about their
daily lives like this is happening already. I for one, assumed that this
sharing was happening already (really, it'd be silly for Google not to do it)
and went about my daily life without being affected by it. Most of the 153
million Americans using Google wouldn't give a damn. At least Google is being
open an honest about it, unlike other companies who change TOS without really
letting the user know. FUBAR indeed.

------
firefox
I didn't see that coming, no, not with the creation of gmail, google docs, the
acquisition of Youtube and everything else we use, why on earth would they
want to put all my info into one place?... c'mon people! Facebook knows more
about you than Google, and (shock) they're a for-profit organization, if they
can target better ads to you, they will. I don't personally like this but as a
corporation it's what they've to do.

------
po
_Nothing happens on an Apple device without Cupertino’s knowledge, and as a
result Apple can perfectly tailor its devices for its users (and ratchet up
record-breaking quarterly earnings in the process)._

Stopped reading at this point.. Does apple know if I tap the home screen? Does
apple know that I just used twitter? No. This claim shows their willingness to
throw around unsubstantiated ideas as fact.

------
adjwilli
Please no more extremetech.com links on Hacker News. There mobile website is
terrible. Plus all that tracking software isn't nice.

------
gorm
Funny. extremetech uses at least 9 different pieces of tracking software on
their page reported by ghostery

------
BenoitEssiambre
Although I don't like the way Google is starting to control too much online, I
believe that using the social network and other information to influence
search and other services is the future.

Google’s move towards social search could be the most significant change in
the way we use the web since the beginning of Google itself. Consider that
with this move, Google is actually moving away from their flagship Pagerank
algorithm.

Google has already mentioned it wants to hold our online identity and others
have speculated that Google wants to be a “reputation engine”
([http://rossdawsonblog.com/weblog/archives/2011/08/breaking-g...](http://rossdawsonblog.com/weblog/archives/2011/08/breaking-
google-will-be-a-reputation-engine.html)).

It is not difficult to see that the next step is to make search results
dependent on reputation and on the trust friends and +1’d organisations have
in particular websites.

Difficulty to establish identity and trust is one of the main shortcomings of
the web compared to the real world, especially when doing business. It is much
easier to judge character and establish trust in a local face to face
relationship than on the web. Locally we can observe others interacting with a
person of interest or ask questions to neighbors who are likely to have some
knowledge about each other.

I have been interested in algorithmic trust metrics
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trust_metric>) for a while. If I was starting
grad school over, I think I might have picked this field for my research.
Things like Subjective logic (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjective_logic>)
are similar to the way humans establish trust in real life and search engines
could improve their results by using it. There are ways to quantify not only
direct relationships but also indirect ones where one can trust an entity
because some other trusted party, trusts them. The fact that we are all
connected by few degrees of separation (some say at most six) makes this truly
powerful.

It is probably too computationally expensive to generate a complete global
trust network for each google+ user but a team of smart engineers should be
able to cluster users with similar opinions or apply the relevant algorithms
greedily. Although it is a computationally difficult problem, Google might
just be the company that has enough servers to throw at the problem.

The trust network paradigm isn’t limited to search. When plugged into a global
trust engine, people or organisations that do transactions online, on eBay for
example, could forgo the need to rely on vast amounts of random customer
feedback to establish trust but instead users could request to see a trust
path from themselves to a target person before doing business. This means that
new eBay users could bring their reputation from elsewhere with them when just
starting to sell. Inversely, it may become possible for google+ users to "+1"
eBay’s reputation system and their search results would then contain things
that people with good reputation on eBay have +1’d or linked to.

The transition from rankings based on random websites’ link contents which
often include SEO manipulations to rankings based on individually chosen
trusted sources has the potential to be revolutionary. I can’t wait for the
day when each search result is accompanied by text stating “recommended this
because you +1’d this guy who +1’d this organisation who links a lot to this
site.” The mechanism could be used in every kind of relationships and might
help picking new employees, friends, doctors or even politicians.

I hope Google doesn't become a monopoly in this, like many people I am
unconformable with their growing reach. However, if they manage to provide a
transparent trust network and provide better search results based on it, it
will add a lot of value to the web.

tl;dr I suspect Google wants all its services integrated with social because
it is trying to build a trust network.

~~~
bambax
> _Things like Subjective logic are similar to the way humans establish trust
> in real life and search engines could improve their results by using it._

Trust in real life is broken. Google Search (1999 version) was a HUGE
IMPROVEMENT over the "it's who you know" way of doing things that had always
existed. Suddenly, you didn't have to know a guy who knew a guy who had a bike
to find information about something.

It seems completely crazy to me that we would want to go back to the old way
of doing things. I use Google to find out about things my friends don't know
(if they did, I'd have asked them).

------
rhaphazard
My initial reaction was DON'T BE EVIL. But after some thought and some
reading, I realize that technology advances and we don't know what the results
and consequences will be until quite a bit of time has passed. I really want
to trust Google, so please don't be evil.

------
chalst
There is a possible search quality motive for SPYW, which is that weighting
social networks allows proxies for personal trust to be brought into ranking
search results, diluting the value of some obnoxious SEO strategies.

------
TDL
So if I am not logged in when I use GOOG search I won't have the tailored
results, correct? If that is the case, what are the privacy concerns? Will the
results of my search still be "inferior"?

------
chmike
I'ld like to vote wih me feet.

This is not a walled garden thing, it is about putting users in glass houses
controled by google.

We need to get out of this trap, and fast. Make these services crowed sourced
and open source.

------
alextingle
Right. All of Google's cookies are now blocked on my browser.

------
jmcmoto
this argument is RETARDED. Just log out if you dont want personalized results.
All these people writing articles are paid PR Shills for FB or Twitter or
someone.

~~~
fred_nada
Yes, I use Bing and starting to use DDG for tech queries... You are wrong
about fb/twitter are the only ones who care.

Look at all of the comments on the blogs... Here is one for an example.
<http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/search-plus-your-world/>

This doesn't just effect twitter/fb

------
skeltoac
Eventually Google's algorithms will be so smart that they will detect your
sentiments and give you the experience you remember from 2005.

------
orenmazor
why does it creep the crap out of me when google gathers personal information,
but I dont care if facebook/apple do it?

~~~
laconian
Tech blog echo chamber?

------
kzrdude
"Nothing happens on an Apple device without Cupertino’s knowledge"

I hope that's false. This device runs linux.

------
eligottlieb
Welp, I need to work more. Google is quickly creating my customer base.

------
augiehill
More sensationalist BS by those who would see themselves profit from the fall
of the leader. These changes are all about improving relevance of search
results and thus improving the user experience!

------
yanw
Nothing spikes pageviews like Google bashing.

~~~
GiraffeNecktie
Unless it's Apple bashing.

~~~
yanw
Nah, Apple has the best PR in the business; even posts about their revenue
generate massive views.

------
kahawe
> _If you don’t get that, then you should probably work somewhere else._

If I was working at a company and my boss would use such "STFU"-style
statements, I would consider quitting sooner rather than later.

And here is why: I remember in my old company, the time when our boss started
using similar rhetorics it did not take long for the whole thing to go down
the drain because he would continue clinging to bad major decisions for dear
life, against all the resistance and warnings of practically all his employees
and those "STFU" phrases were, I guess, his way of coping by closing his eyes
to the inevitable wall we were speeding towards. Like a reality-distortion
field kicked into overdrive gone haywire.

Seeing Larry use such a phrase at the SPYW-launch staff event makes you wonder
just how much internal disagreement there really was amongst google's
employees.

Not a good signs at all, if you ask me.

------
fred_nada
Wow - 65% of people say they will cancel their Google Account over the Privacy
changes...

[http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-user-
polls/post/wil...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-user-
polls/post/will-you-cancel-your-google-
account/2012/01/24/gIQAOdVHOQ_blog.html)

~~~
yanw
_Full disclosure: Washington Post Co. Chairman and chief executive Donald E.
Graham is a member of Facebook's board of directors._

They omitted it this time it seems.

~~~
fred_nada
disclosure of what? Do you think he voted 15,000 times?

