While I was not surprised by today's story about leaked plans by Google to offer massive online file storage for users, it left me wondering how relevant such a service is. I would think (or at least like to think) that most people would be like myself and be extremely hesitant to store any sensitive or personal information on Google's servers. I am a programmer, and I can guarantee that some guys just randomly browse through some of these files. People in IT are always looking at stuff they're not supposed to. Not to mention, I don't trust any company, not even Google, to securely stash my information away from hackers. And we all know they're sifting through all that data and mining it for information they can sell to advertisers to feed me "targeted ads".

Yes, I do realize that by having a Gmail account with Google, they already are in possession of probably the most personal information I have stored on my computer. I try not to think about it that way, but it's true. I guess I just have some weird value system that thinks storing files online is one step too far.

Everyone sees Google heading down the path of an online operating system, but people seem quick to forget that you need an operating system on your computer in order to boot up and connect to the internet. Unless Google writes it's own Windows-lite, it's not going to step out of the shadow of Microsoft anytime soon.

This entry was posted by Brad, on Tuesday, March 07, 2006. You can leave your response.