Google Reader: Naughty or Nice? Santa Safe!
Poor Santa? Leave it to Slashdot to drag him through the snow in search of a link-worthy headline: “Google Reader shares private data, ruins Christmas.”
REALLY? Felipe Hoffa’s accusation is off the mark, way off.
In the “Sharing With Friends” feature, Google Reader is NOT deviously “sharing” any private data, as Hoffa melodramatically asserts:
As each day Google hoards more of your data there is an implicit deal that makes this possible: You give Google your private data, while they keep it private. That deal would fail miserably is someday Google decided unilaterally to share your data with more people. For example, with all your Gmail contacts. Many people fear that this might happen someday, but they don’t need to wait anymore as it has already happened.
Contrary to Hoffa’s beliefs, there is no privacy “deal” implicit in ANY of Google services which require login. Google’s privacy policies make that abundantly clear: Google is free to do whatever it likes, for as long as it likes, with any user data that is forked over to its servers by anyone. Gmail, for example:
Google maintains and processes your Gmail account and its contents to provide the Gmail service to you… and other purposes relating to offering you Gmail.
The “other purposes” Google disclaimer gives Google the explicit right to do virtually anything it wants with the data of others willingly handed to it for perpetual “hoarding.”
Google Reader’s privacy policy:
We may also use personal information for auditing, research and analysis to operate and improve Google technologies and services.
What does such an open ended Google disclaimer allow Google to do with all user data obtained via Google Reader? Undoubtedly anything it wants to do, as GOOG 411 proves. SEE: Google Warning: How GOOG 411 Tricks Consumers.
Despite that all Google Reader users agree to Google’s Terms Of Service, Hoffa is ”appalled” that Google has not “apologized” for its latest Google Reader sharing “enhancement” and has not offered a “quick fix” to the (not so) legions of Google Reader users that are not quite sure what to make of the new and improved Google Reader.
For Google, the Reader case is nevertheless clear:
The “share” feature was always intended to imply some amount of publicity. That’s why we used the term “share” and had shared items marked as public by default on the Settings > Tags page.
There’s a “clear your shared items” link on the Settings > Friends page if you urgently need to remove the items you’ve shared in the past.
It is still possible (as before) to share specific tags, or your starred items, independently of your shared items feed. This is a good alternative for people who have more specific uses for this feature than the general concept of “sharing.”
Hoffa’s Christmas plea is that Google Reader users are revolting en masse. But, it is a tried and true blog tactic to use Google Group or blog comment thread remarks as a proxy for average user reaction and thereby spin exagerated tales.
Commenters are nevertheless always but a minority of users, regardless of the company involved. What’s more, while many of the Google Reader Group commenters are indeed negative, many are also simply bewildered by the new feature and some are even down right happy with it!
The new Google Reader sharing actually gets a big thumbs up from many Group posters:
very cool, awesome, great idea, thanks Google, I absolutely love you…
WOW! Those Google Reader users certainly are enjoying their Christmas, thanks to Google!
Google Maps users, on the other hand, are NOT faring as well. SEE: Lost On Google Maps! What Merry Christmas?
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