

Badly needed Buzz improvement #1: individually hide followees - hussong
http://anwag.posterous.com/badly-needed-buzz-improvement-1-individually

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bonaldi
"My son’s real first and last name, with a number of additional, probably
location based infos just one click away." Facebook is exactly the same, and
yet nobody is complaining that they've forced real names public.

As for his problem here, he can just hide his following list, which is now a
one-click option when he first joins Buzz. That's if his son even has a
profile, which until he joins Buzz, he won't have.

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kylec
Exactly. I don't understand why people are being hard on Google but give
Facebook a free pass for doing pretty much the same thing. Granted, you have
to put in your email credentials (something which scares me, but most Facebook
users won't think twice) which gives Facebook permission scan your address
book for 'friends'. They even retain email addresses that aren't tied to
accounts so that if they are ever registered Facebook can tie them back to
your account.

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qjz
I don't give Facebook a free pass. I don't trust Facebook or have any interest
in their services, so I don't have an account. I've had a Gmail account for
years, and I'm being hard on Google precisely because it's "doing pretty much
the same thing" as Facebook.

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bmelton
Is there some reason that 'blocking' a person wouldn't accomplish this? I keep
seeing people request this, but within Google Profiles, there is a 'block'
feature that you can apply to a given person. I admittedly haven't tested it,
but I honestly can't imagine what else it might do.

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crux
OP is actually saying that he wants to be able to follow someone, but have
them hidden from his list. His example is his son; he doesn't want to block
his son, he wants to have their Google connection but not create a public list
of all his nearest and dearest, with all the included information that Google
provides.

~~~
KC8ZKF
But isn't it his son who decides what to share and with whom? (Or him through
his son's account settings.) His son can block location information, or limit
it to groups he controls, for example.

