Google's New About Me Tool Is the Anti-Google+ 54
An anonymous reader writes: Google has launched a new tool called About me that lets you see, edit, and remove the personal information that the company's services show to other users. Google confirmed to VentureBeat that the feature started rolling out to users this week. Google's various products and services (Gmail, Hangouts, Google Maps, Inbox, Google Play, YouTube, Google+, and so on) sometimes ask you to share certain personal information. These details are then shown to other users who interact with you or search for you. Until now, all of this was stored in Google+, assuming you created an account. But Google+ is no longer a requirement for Google's services, and so the company needs a new solution, and ideally one that isn't public by default.
With Apologies to Niels Bohr: (Score:5, Funny)
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Hmm.. you know, it never occurred to me until I read your post why the Cybermen say that.
Main challenge to me (Score:5, Insightful)
If you ever pissed off google by violating a rule or policy, they could (and did in some cases) disable the google+ account. Which had the effect of killing all your associated google devices.
So the risk was too great to actually use google+ and associate it with my devices. I hate facebook, but if they ban me, I'm only banned from facebook. Google needs to firewall physical devices from any chance of ban problems due to offenses in other google services or it's not worth the risk of using them.
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A fact which does nothing to undermine his valid point.
Re:Main challenge to me (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude, the Internet works just fine without Google.
Actually, it kind of doesn't.
A very large amount of all the web pages on the internet now load pieces of themselves from google domains and don't work well or at all without those pieces. googleapis.com anybody? It's all over the fucking internet. Want to sign up for a site? Oh, that requires google's "recaptcha" service. You can't sign up without letting google know.
Want to email them and complain? Well, that non-google-looking contact address is actually served by gmail.
More than most people know, the internet can no longer be used normally without google. Try blocking everything from every google owned IP block, and using the internet. Some sites might work, sure, but many of the most popular ones won't. Most people would consider it "broken". We are handing not just all our personal info google, but de-facto control over the web as well.
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Applications on other side of Internet (Score:3)
Unless you happen to live in an area whose best home ISP is Google Fiber, the Internet as a network works without Google. But one still needs an alternative to the applications on the other side of the network.
Search: In my experience, Bing search was not nearly as effective. The last time I tried Bing It On, Google beat Bing on 3.5 out of the 5 queries, probably three Google wins, one Bing win, and one draw. So what search engine "works fine" in your opinion?
Video sharing: What site other than YouTube for
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Mobile operating system: Is Amazon's Fire OS substantially less evil than Android with Google Play?
This isn't a very good comparison. Amazon's Fire OS is Android with no Play Store access. The better comparison would be to Apple, and it still makes your point as Apple is just as sleezy.
Re: Applications on other side of Internet (Score:2)
It would be a strange choice indeed to go from Google to bing. I chose DuckDuckGo. Literally the only thing I miss is time related search (ie search for results in the last 48 hours).
Re:Main challenge to me (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's an example:
Google+ Account suspended so now they can't use Youtube (really an unrelated service).
https://productforums.google.c... [google.com]
The more services tied to your google+ account, the greater the risk of it being suspended.
https://productforums.google.c... [google.com]
My Google Wallet account was suspended today. Google Support tells me that my account won't be reinstated, due to violations of terms of service. They won't tell me specifically what I violated, and refuse to acknowledge my questions. I've used GMAIL for over 10 years. 2004 I signed up for the BETA for my first Google account. Today I'm suspended. I don't even care about the Wallet honestly, I just care about the Play Store. I can no longer purchase applications from the Play Store. With Wallet suspended, how can I even use my Android device now? This is insane.
http://tech.slashdot.org/story... [slashdot.org]
From a Google VP.. while google+ suspensions only effect services requiring a google+ account, he goes on to say "Of course there are other Google-wide policies (e.g. egregious spamming, illegal activity, etc) that do apply to all Google products, and violations of these policies could in fact lead to a Google-wide suspension."
That's a big 'etc."
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Visa chargeback for any app you paid for that no longer works
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I just care about the Play Store. I can no longer purchase applications from the Play Store
For me, this has been a really good reason not to buy any applications from Google Play. I set up a new throw-away account for each device to download the free apps that I can only find in Google Play, but most of what I run is now from F-Droid. I've donated to a few of those projects, because I know that their apps won't randomly stop working at the whim of a third party.
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As opposed to? Do you still use a flip phone?
Welp, this still uses Google+ (Score:5, Informative)
In step 3 (the advertising preferences thing), if you try to modify what it says your google profile is for advertising purposes, it asks you to create a google+ account for the privilege.
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The whole site is plagued with issues.
For instance, as a non-Google Now user who was apparently opted-in to it at some point without my knowledge, when I get to step 3 in the Privacy Checkup, I get a rather unhelpful popup that simply says "error" when I click the "Turn these cards off" button, even after disabling all of my ad-blockers or anything else that might be preventing it from talking to one of their servers.
If you go to "Manage Activity" for your YouTube history, it gives you a link to "Get Starte
"Sometimes ask" - hehe (Score:5, Insightful)
>> Google's various products and services (Gmail, Hangouts, Google Maps, Inbox, Google Play, YouTube, Google+, and so on) sometimes ask you to share certain personal information.
Google starts collecting everything it can about who you are and what you do in all its products and services unless you explicitly go down into the basement and yank seventeen different files from a bathroom with a sign that says "Beware of the Leopard."
FTFY
This whole "you need to spend an hour on our site hoping you've tweaked your privacy settings correctly, at least until we change everything again in three months" is BS. As the family tech guru, I've gone from teaching people how to use non-IE browsers to how to install the best possible Ad/Flash/tracking-blocking software I can find on all their personal computers and devices.
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Did you check the site? I was able to review (and update) all my settings in about 5 minutes. Maybe you're complaining about facebook's privacy configuration?
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I'm with Fwipp there, did you actually visit the site?
Mine shows my name, my birth date (hidden), my sex, and where I have lived previously (shared...who cares if they know I have lived in Albuquerque NM, it isn't like I was a star in Breaking Bad...).
If someone is looking for my name, they are likely looking for me, as there aren't too many in the world with my name.
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If they know that little about computers, the chances are that all they want is email and web surfing, and if that's true, you can easily set them up with Linux and cut your support time by 90%.
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I figure that it's a trap. They're trying to get you to verify your identity. Sure, they'll remove it from the PUBLIC domain but that doesn't mean they'll be removing it from their data base.
Can't edit some things (Score:4, Interesting)
What good is a tool like that if you can't edit everything? I have a birthday listed, that is wrong - I can make it private but I can't fix it.
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Look at it this way: do you really want google to know your birthday?
Really takin' those chains off, eh? (Score:2)
I've used Google's various services for a good many years, and have steadfastly refused to use Plus. So aside from the core Plus features themselves, exactly what "services" required signing up for Plus to use them?
Now, if you say that I can get back the usable classic version of Google Maps instead of this worthless abomination they replaced it with... That alone might get me to finally sign up for Plus!
Comment removed (Score:3)
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If you care about privacy then why are you putting personal information on there to begin with?
If you care about privacy, why do you use the Internet or have a computer or phone? If you care about privacy, why don't you stay locked up at home? If you care about privacy, it is your right to live in a small closet.
We had this right of not being on video 24/7. That can't stand, as much as we'd like. We'd still like to draw up a few guidelines.
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Nice false dichotomy there. I hope Poe's Law applies here.
The internet has a hell of a lot of really great things on it. Getting to 90% of those things doesn't require disclosing any personal information; getting to 90% of what remains only requires disclosing as much as I want to (for example, writing this post on Slashdot).
Of the 1% remaining that truly requires knowing at least some IRL identifying information (ba
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I hope Cole's law applies here. It involves this cabbage, see...
Your misplaced anger amuses me. "Come to the Dark Side, Luke!" ...thing is, it's not possible to avoid ubiquitous surveillance, that's part of what you should pick up out of the "ubiquitous" part. That's already done and is not going away. It's getting stronger by the minute. We would like to perhaps have some customs that say what is right. Those won't last, either, they'll be obsolete by the time you've tweeted them on your tw_t account, whic
YouTube still needs Google+ for commenting (Score:4, Insightful)
Despite Google saying otherwise, it is still impossible to comment on YouTube without first creating a Google+ account.
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Google+ no longer req for services?????? (Score:2)
Tell that to YT comment box.
I'm doing something right (Score:2)
This isn't new (Score:1)
Re: This isn't new (Score:2)
Shhh. All of the anti-Google "rebels" finally have a chance to shine; don't ruin if for the poor dears.