A small uproar has begun as a result of Google’s change to Google Reader. That change is that all of your shared news items will be shared with your Gmail contacts. Apparently, some people have gotten upset about this and are complaining that it is an invasion of their privacy.
Google, of course, has always been very sensitive to user privacy. Their services use a very centralized authentication system. It also goes without saying that Google is in a position to collect quite a bit of information about you. This puts them in a position where it is even more important than every to be very transparent as regards privacy.
Well, Google got a lot of complaints about this new feature. Google then issued a public response that pissed off some people for being vague.
Some of the complaints read things like:
"This is the worst "feature" you have ever introduced."
"This is a terrible idea, and a violation of privacy, and it contradicts your own documentation". "Please don’t turn the best feed reader on the web into the shittiest social network on the web."
"I WAS using the shared feed for myself as a way to backup important RSS feeds, not to share with people I hardly know who happen to be in my address book."
"This is going to sound like hyperbole, but this new feature has actually RUINED CHRISTMAS for my family! "
Is any of this ringing the familiar tune of Facebook’s Beacon?
A few popular bloggers have chimed in: Scoble. ParisLemon.
When I saw this feature myself, I didn’t have concerns about privacy. Look, this is why the feature is called SHARED. When you SHARE something, you are making it available to somebody else. Now, I do think that Google mishandled the situation by not providing an opt out option. It doesn’t alleviate the fact that these users who are complaining seem to have a basic understanding of what the word SHARE means.
This is all aside from the fact that this new feature is a rather dumb gimmick anyway.
Google should take the step of implementing GPC (Granular Privacy Control), as Scoble points out.
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I see Google as just another step towards Big Brother utopia. If it was a Government people would already be protesting in the streets by now. The fact that everything is archived is the reason why I don’t use Googlemail, Picasa or any of the “products” that the company provides other than the search engine. “Do no evil”? That presumptuous mantra is going to come back and bite everyone in the arse, I say.