http://www.searchenginejournal.com/hitwise-was-acquired-by-experian-for-250m/4744/

The article.

Sorry for that.

Check out my post from April about Experians Acquisition of Hitwise. This makes Google look like a joke in comparison.

I really don’t want Google deciding what they think I want to see based on my search history. On the other hand, I like having the toolbar.

So, it would be nice to have a more obvious way to opt out of services I don’t want to participate in. Doing so now is a lesson in frustration. Just try to find an “opt out” option…

And, I really don’t like the idea of a Google van driving by and taking pictures of me scratching myself in my living room!

write, like, a lot of…stuff, and hope it convinces someone that, like, there’s probably some meaning in all of those, you know, words.

While you’re suggesting that Google notified the press to get promotional value out of the resistance, I think it’s likely that it was done to help bolster support in resisting the data request. Wouldn’t it be stupidly limiting to not try to enlist the public to support one’s resistance to the government’s demands?

Other companies that apparently turned over data with no resistance perhaps appraised the situation and decided they’d have more to lose than to gain. Google could’ve easily concluded that as well — after all, doesn’t Google want the government to support them in various initiatives? Google wants a more open market for wireless spectrum and how about the importance of their cause in favor of net neutrality?

I think it’s easier to argue that Google’s resistance of the government’s demands was more altruistic than selfish, even though they undoubtedly benefit from public perception in doing so.

I think that action alone probably should’ve given them a “get out of jail free” card where the Privacy International report comes in.

That however, is not the real issue. PI’s generally shoddy methodology and subjective conclusions shed a poor light on our industry’s ability to address this issue – that should be the focus. At this point, any conclusion from the PI study is relevant only in that it gets PI more press. It does nothing to further a substantive solution to online privacy.

I visit the BBC website perhaps once a month. I run Google Toolbar, use Gmail, Google Search (of course), Google Docs, and visit countless sites that run either AdSense, Analytics or both. I also run AdSense, have AdWords accounts, etc. With the vast amounts of data Google has acquired (and their stated intent to index the worlds information), they ought to be held at a higher standard – which it appears they may have been in this report.