Its not like Google aquired a whole lot of companies wholly and changed them or shut them down.

Yes there are a few major ones (see list)

Picasa - I dont think there are are any privacy concerns with this product.
Keyhole (Google earth now)
Dodgeball - was shut down
Android - its is big product of Google now ... I still refuse to believe any privacy issues in Android - its just that Google decided to integate its own products in its own mobile OS (many companies do that).
Writely -
Youtube -
GrandCentral

and a few other smaller ones in between.

How many of these do you think it changed to warrant a privacy concern to which there are no other alternatives ?

Read my reply in the other thread before judging, please.

Actually, all of the projects that you mentioned that were purchased (Android was developed in house), had their policies changed when they were absorbed by Google.

Google - like most companies - has reserved the right for all of those services to use and meter those services as they feel necessary. Whether or not you've noticed the effect is irrelevant to the fact that the privacy aspect does matter.

BTW: I remember reading this weekend about Google Dashboard where it was supposedly said by someone at Google that people don't value their privacy, hence why Google can offer services for little to no cost, and pretty much mine information to their hearts content.

If people really cared, they'd log into the Google Dashboard, and ask the hard question of "how does the information in all f these services feed Google's pockets - and how can I make intelligent decisions about which services I wish them to log such data and which not?"

People don't ask. Therefore privacy isn't an issue. And is altogether a conversation about an illusion that has never existed except in the minds of those that refuse to open their eyes to life beyond dreaming.

Why do I constantly bash Google all the time?

My post below is far from flawless (made it up within 3 minutes), but it explains why I'm strongly against monopolists like Google (and earlier Microsoft).



"If you read this, do you know why I'm *****ing about Google? Because I know a huge number of uninformed people visits the forums, and Google needs to be stopped. I could argue about this, but I prefer to do other things instead.

But I have time to make Google look bad for the vast majority, and if you don't understand why this is needed, you'll either thank me in the future (if not too late), or you're simply dependent on Google already.


IBM, Microsoft, Intel, Apple... this has happened too many times. Google has already surpassed the most of them, and yet they're considered as nice.

I'm partly doing this for myself, because I don't want to live in a second communistic regime (you obviously don't know how it is... ask people who have experienced something like that), and I'm doing others a favor at the same time (I guess they have the same feelings about communism as I do, just not being aware of it).

And please, don't say that Google isn't a threat for the human freedom. Google Books has created a huge unwill of writing for European authors, and this is one of Google's "nicer" services. And yet no one does anything about it...

I know I can't do anything as a single person, but at least I decided to let others know...


Please answer on the following question, and then I can discuss further, because I know how strong relations some people already have with Google.

Do you consider that evolution can happen without alternatives?

The evolution theory is just a model, but that model can describe many phenomenon around the world, and the tech world isn't an exception. Google is slowly but steadily gaining monopoly on every single market (except Windows to be replaced by Chrome OS within 10 years if attraction against Google won't be done), and that can't certainly be good for the future of the human kind, right!?

Please reply what you think about that, and don't say that this is fantasy or something else: this is the reality - a reality which I don't want to be part of. I don't know how it's about you, at least I'm doing something to change it.


I can't do much, but it's better than nothing. At least I'm not defending a company that doesn't need it.



Since I joined here last month you obviously don't know much about me, but I did the same thing against Microsoft's Windows services some years ago - which isn't a threat anymore. In my opinion, Google is the one we must focus on right now, or who else has the highest priority according to you (because there's always some evil in this world)?"

you know, it's not only google being google. it's also google being a company in the U.S.:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/...icle675014.ece

And I heard from my sister's neighbour's friend's son that .....

Seriousy, you posted that why?

you are worse than c0rt3x you bash anyone that dislikes google and jump to googles defence thats all i've seen you do in all your posts on here, at least c0rt3x only bashes the company and not the people liking them

My biggest worry is that Google is getting too big and they are getting very very ripe for antitrust litigation. I think that's the main reason Google stepped back from acquiring Yahoo.

On the other hand, antitrust doesn't seem to have any teeth anymore.

This is an excellent article! And scary, too.

A bit about Google's Linux/open-source contributions: http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/opensource/?p=1048