How Hard is It To Quit Google For a Week

[engine]

How Hard is It To Quit Google For a Week [news.cnet.com]

From search and Google Maps to Gmail and YouTube, it can be difficult to steer clear of the Google experience during a daily trip around the Internet.

But it's not impossible, and it's not even remotely comparable to giving up one of the most addictive drugs on the planet. During a week in which I pledged to avoid using anything made, owned, or otherwise produced by Google, it was surprisingly easy to cut ties.

I just thought this was an interesting angle. Is it the same as quitting any mainstream service, or, as Tom put it, quitting smoking.

[Leosghost]

It's much harder to avoid their cookies..and thus their tracking .. ( and apparently he didn't even try )..and I don't just mean the personalisation ones ..

[Propools]

I tried quitting, just to see if I could do it but then I noticed the following:

1. lower tolerance - needed to engage in the addictive behavior more and more to get the desired effect
   
2. Started going through withdrawals, shakes, vomiting, typing on the keyboard in my sleep
   
3. Had difficulty cutting down or controlling my addictive behavior
   My social, occupational and recreational activities became more focused around my addiction, and important social and occupational roles began being jeopardized
   
4. Extreme mood changes – happy, sad, excited, anxious, etc
   
5. Sleeping a lot less than usual and at different times of day and night, sometimes at my desk
   
6. I started feeling unwell at certain times and better at other times
   
7. The pupils seemingly smaller or larger than usual and at different times, sometimes one is dilated and the other is small
   
8. My friends and family started noting changes in social groups, new and unusual friends, odd cell-phone conversations
   
9. They also noticed repeated unexplained outings, often with a sense of urgency
   

So I threw in the towel and

1. bought back into Adwords
2. posted a few hundred YouTube videos
3. pinpointed every place I had ever been on google maps
4. Spent hours going over and over
5. then over again my Google Analytics
6. name tagged thousands of pictures in my Picasa and uploaded them
7. Re-instituted Google Chat on our site
8. went bonkers when I realized how long I've been out of Google Video Chat
9. Updated my Google Calendar
10. Hugged my monitor when I opened Google Docs back up

I could just keep going on and on but then I'm afraid you wouldn't believe me.

TTFN - ;)

[graeme_p]

It's much harder to avoid their cookies..and thus their tracking .. ( and apparently he didn't even try )..and I don't just mean the personalisation ones

No Google sites, no third party cookies, clear cookies at the end of each session.