zCat - 12:33 pm on Jun 8, 2006 (gmt 0)

If I wanted to, I could have my surfing habits observed by AdSense, Google Analytics, Google Toolbar and that Google WebAccelerator (?) thing (is it still about?), my browser preferences and cookie settings tracked by Google Browser Sync (and possibly the WebAccelerator), my mail tracked by Gmail, my spreadsheet calculations by Google Spreadsheets and my sleeping activities by Google Bedsheets. And via Orkut they also know which Brazilian drug dealers I'm associated with. And as an added bonus Google will also save me the trouble of censoring anything I post online which might offend the Chinese government.

Actually removing tinfoil hat I don't believe in any way Google is deliberately out to spy on me personally, or humanity in general. Nevertheless the steady buildup of data in a jurisdiction outside of my influence, which is associated with a particular web-usage profile, and which in turn can quite often be associated with a particular person, does leave me with an increasingly uneasy feeling. Even though I'm a tech-savvy person who proactively takes care of his (or her ;-) online identity.

[edit]clarify a sentence[/edit]