Does Google break it's motto?

[Arktis]

Google's motto of course is, "Don't be evil.". I noticed some people on this forum like to talk about google very passionately at times, so I decided to start this thread and see what the different perspectives are.

Is Google bad? If so, in what ways? What does it stand to harm in the forseeable future? Particularly, what are the privacy issues and what are the implications of said issues? If google isn't bad, how can the average Joe be assured of this?

What about that special cookie? (Google gives everyone a cookie that expires in 2038 and carries your very own unique identifier. If you don't believe me, just check for it or see http://www.imilly.com/google-cookie.htm for information.)

[BWF89]

http://www.google-watch.org/

[Knomefan]

OMG google is the cookie m0n5ter!!!111!!!!111

[zenwhen]

Google isn't a charitable organization. They have to make money somehow. There is nothing wrong with Google knowing how you use the site they let you use for free.

[Rackerz]

Hmmmm i used the GoogleAnon thing. It made me paranoid, so i thought what the hell! Google doesn't seem bad to me, and maybe what they do isn't for bad purposes.

[sapo]

I have more important things to think about.. i cant waste my time with paranoid stuff..

Microsoft does worst things but i m sure you and most of people use it.. so if you think that way, just go to mars or kill youself.

[prizrak]

As was mentioned in another thread by poptones, Google is a multinational corporation and has to obey laws of different countries and some of those countries laws dictate that Google keep certain records and that it discloses those at the request of the government. Google itself is not evil but it has to make money and some of the ways for instance ad targetting through scanning your e-mail makes them able to give you the 2gig inbox.

[Nana]

What zenwhen, sapo and prizrak said.

Plus, I don't really care for the Google cookie. They can track me all they want, because I know my surfings most likely end up as anonymous numbers among a huge pile of statistical data, and I have absolutely no problem with corporations collecting statistical data about their customers. I don't see any reason why anyone, who isn't a friend or family member, would actually be interested in my surfing habits personally. No matter how much I'd like to believe otherwise, I'm not really that important a person. :rolleyes:

[ssam]

i saw a fun page a while ago about loyalty card trading. loads of info is gathered if you use a loyality card at a supermarket or wherever. if you trade card occationally with people you can confuse the stats (and get send weird junk mail).

it cant be too hard to do cookie trading.

anyone want a go with
ID=90944fc7313123d3:TM=1134228581:LM=1134228581:S= aDfD0FMvPrqgzHy0

[matthew]

My browser is set to delete all cookies except those I tell it to keep every time I close the browser...so this isn't a big deal to me. Cookies are something anyone who want to opt out of can avoid.

Edit: @ssam... that's funny! I do something similar on a regular basis. I just didn't sign up for the loyalty card and every time I go to the grocery store I ask the person behind me if I can use theirs today. I haven't had anyone refuse yet. (I rarely go to the grocery store, my wife-who is a saint-does the shopping and she does have a loyalty card. It's not so much a philosophical thing with me, I just don't want one more thing to carry around.)

[xequence]

I dont find google to be evil in any way. It doesent use any bad business practices like microsoft.

And it is the only thing keeping the giant flashing ads off all sites. Yes, some have them, but alot of sites with ads have nice not annoying google ads.

[Orporg]

With Firefox you can force it to reject cookies from certain sites. I don't know if it covers entire domains but just slap www.google.com into the rejected cookies entries.

Keep in mind that every site can find out your IP address. Google (or any other search engine) could match an IP address to a search.

[prizrak]

Like I said in the other thread, when you go online you give up a certain amount of privacy, that is very normal when entering a public place. It is true for IRL as well people know your house number and your name is on the mailbox, on the street anyone can overhear your conversation or see you, I don't see what the problem is with google or anyone keeping statistics on THEIR users the only problem is when they track what you do in general.