Comments on: Google’s Facebook-esque ‘Profiles’ http://trueslant.com/KashmirHill/2009/05/07/googles-facebook-esque-profiles/ Musings on the ebb and flow of privacy in the digital age Fri, 23 Dec 2011 00:11:44 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Kashmir Hill - The Not-So Private Parts - Google profiles illustrate why security questions need to be rethunk - True/Slant http://trueslant.com/KashmirHill/2009/05/07/googles-facebook-esque-profiles/comment-page-1/#comment-51 Kashmir Hill - The Not-So Private Parts - Google profiles illustrate why security questions need to be rethunk - True/Slant Fri, 15 May 2009 14:00:51 +0000 http://trueslant.com/KashmirHill/?p=199#comment-51 [...] week, I encouraged others to fill out their Facebook-esque profiles with Google as a form of reputation control. Google promises the profile will be the first thing to [...] [...] week, I encouraged others to fill out their Facebook-esque profiles with Google as a form of reputation control. Google promises the profile will be the first thing to [...]

]]> By: frassica http://trueslant.com/KashmirHill/2009/05/07/googles-facebook-esque-profiles/comment-page-1/#comment-24 frassica Fri, 08 May 2009 17:05:41 +0000 http://trueslant.com/KashmirHill/?p=199#comment-24 Carpe once again the opportunity to surrender information that used to require some effort to obtain. We've been exquisitely trained to believe that anything that does not show up on the first page of Google search results does not exist--and that this principle extends to our identities as well. It's a good example of the way a simulacrum of reality (social networking) can supplant our embodied experience of reality. I don't particularly object to the loss of privacy--your headline [http://www.eff.org/press/archives/2009/04/28] strongly suggests that any further data I voluntarily offer would be only a drop in the bucket of what's already available. I do, however, take exception to the logic of the transaction by which I help online marketers further narrow my demographic profile in return for momentarily bumping up the page rank of my identity. In effect, I'm providing something of value in return for commodified personal validation. Not unlike, by the way, the process by which I registered at True/Slant today in order to broadcast my response to this post. Carpe once again the opportunity to surrender information that used to require some effort to obtain. We’ve been exquisitely trained to believe that anything that does not show up on the first page of Google search results does not exist–and that this principle extends to our identities as well. It’s a good example of the way a simulacrum of reality (social networking) can supplant our embodied experience of reality.

I don’t particularly object to the loss of privacy–your headline [http://www.eff.org/press/archives/2009/04/28] strongly suggests that any further data I voluntarily offer would be only a drop in the bucket of what’s already available. I do, however, take exception to the logic of the transaction by which I help online marketers further narrow my demographic profile in return for momentarily bumping up the page rank of my identity. In effect, I’m providing something of value in return for commodified personal validation. Not unlike, by the way, the process by which I registered at True/Slant today in order to broadcast my response to this post.

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