Fh on earth

Google admits they don't understand social software, stock down

2008-02-04T08:10:00.000-03:00

Previously I played with the idea that the fact Google's (GOOG) stock was down was correlated with their Reader's privacy scandal and their lack of understanding of social software. Now it is official:

CFO George Reyes said the company has found that “social networking inventory is not monetizing as well as expected,” leading to higher than expected traffic acquisition costs.
http://blogs.barrons.com/.../-not-monetizing-as-well-as-expected/

Google on Thursday blamed the difficulty of making money from placing adverts on social networking sites for holding back its growth in the latest quarter, contributing to a 9 per cent slump in its shares in after-hours trading.
http://www.ft.com/.../-0000779fd2ac.html

Brin noted some things were tried that didn’t pan out. While Brin won’t talk about partners it’s fairly obvious that MySpace is an issue. Google is obligated to pay at least $900 million in minimum revenue guarantees to MySpace through 2010. Later, the question was revisited again. He noted that Google also has Orkut and other social networking partners. “We have an incredible amount of this inventory,” said Brin. “I don’t think we have the killer best way to monetize social networks yet. We have had a lot of experiments (and some disappointments).”
http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=7835

One of the failed "experiments" Sergey Brin might be referring to is the US$900 million deal they made with MySpace in August, 2006. Maybe they were happy then, but just as they were inking the deal, Facebook was preparing their surprising growth in the shadows. The final blow came when Microsoft, and not Google, bought a portion of Facebook on October, 2007. A big difference on these deals: Microsoft bought Facebook, Google only the right to place ads in MySpace for a lot of money.

Now Google has a bigger threat to worry about: Microsoft is going to buy Yahoo. Google even wrote an official plea at their blog. But I'm not sure who the good guys are anymore. Historically Microsoft has done a lot of wrong, but at least they have never misused my personal data. Not the same with Google. I really trusted Google until they started pushing my shared data to all my GMail's contacts. Almost two months have passed since that day, and they still haven't done anything to correct their wrong. So who should I worry more now? The desktop monopolist, or the personal data one?

More at Techmeme: Google not monetizing social network inventory and their anti MSyahoo plea.

should people invest in the old new Starbucks?

2008-01-16T23:02:00.000-03:00

Howard Schultz is back at Starbucks (SBUX). Recently people were leaving the company for dead as their last CEO - Jim Donald - kept destroying its values. A sign of their despair was that they had never bought TV ads, until their same store sales kept going down for the first time in their history. Previously a leaked letter revealed how Schultz pleaded Donald not to forget Starbucks' roots.

On January 2008 David was "fired" and Schultz came back to replace him. The question is: Will Schultz be able to recover Starbucks' former glory?

McDonald's (MCD) had a similar story on 2002-2003. Their stock kept going down until Jim Cantalupo came back to the CEO post. He had retired on 2002, but he came back on 2003 as the company kept destroying its value. After his comeback McDonald's experienced an amazing recovery.

Will people come back to Starbucks now that Schultz is back?

On 2003 my question was if people would go back to eat junk food. They did thanks to Cantalupo. Will they go back to drink coffee thanks to Schultz?

Maybe a key difference is that's not the same going back to buy cheap food as going back to buy expensive coffee. Especially in the current crisis enviroment.

a social blog platform business plan

2008-01-16T19:35:00.000-03:00

Bligoo is a Chilean based social blog platform. Previously I've offered them some public criticism and advice (both links in spanish).

Today they unveiled (link in spanish) their new business plan developed by MBA students at UCLA. You can find the whole presentation online (video, audio and slides).

Basically they plan to get $1.5 million in funding before October 2008 to grow from the 50,000 current users to more than 1 million in 2010, while they grow their revenues from $432,000 to $2,556,000 at the same time (mostly by advertising). Their projected valuation is $12.7 million in 2010 based on value per-user.

The main advice from the MBA students to Bligoo was to focus on a niche, and they found the most fitting for them is "social activism" (education, Greenpeace, legal reforms, "green" blogs, etc).

What I found interesting of this business plan is the following: I looked for the MBA class professor resume (Robert Spich), and there I found this interesting bit about him:

"...Dr. Spich continued his professional formation with field experience in economic development projects and technical assistance for the Peace Corps in Chile and the Agency for International Development in Washington D.C..."

So the guy that guided this business plan not only has lived in Chile, he has also shown great interest in social activism. Did he give the best advice for Bligoo, or was he slanted towards this conclusion?

Note (as a reader asked me about the confidentiality status of this information): The referenced business plan was published by Bligoo's CEO in his blog linked in the second paragraph.

Scoble kicked out from Facebook

2008-01-03T14:11:00.000-03:00

Blogging celebrity Robert Scoble has been kicked out from Facebook today.

Using his own words "I could call people idiots for not understanding the meaning of the..." Facebook terms of use, that disallow using automated scrapers. There is even a Facebook API that could have helped him obtain this information easily and without trouble. On the other hand, Facebook could have avoided this new "scandal" if they warned users before completely disabling their accounts. Why call the users idiots, Robert, if companies can act smart and adapt to human nature (instead of dictating them how to behave)? Contracts and legal terms might improve lawyers lives, but they won't improve normal human relations or any company's reputation.

The good news: The Standardized Data Portability efforts will get a boost thanks to this situation.

As usual, more at Techmeme.

Update: He was using a tool to extract his friends e-mails. Unfortunately Facebook's API doesn't allow exporting e-mails, although the platform will happilly import them from elsewhere.

Google stock down after Reader's privacy scandal

2008-01-03T09:30:00.000-03:00

After Google Reader's privacy scandal got to the major press (and elsewhere) GOOG stock has just gone down. Their own stock market site shows the news as one of the factors involved:

That reference has misteriously disappeared since, but the stock keeps going down:

I don't think the market is that simple, and a single factor can't explain why the stock market goes up or down in the short term. Nevertheless it's a fun way to tell the Google Reader team to at least worry about their stock options. If they don't care about their users' privacy, maybe they'll care about their own money.

Google Reader's poor decision making

2008-01-01T20:27:00.000-03:00

Google Reader's blunder has been covered by The New York Times, The Guardian, and many other media around the world. The big backslash started when this post was featured on Slashdot's front page. The scandal has centered on privacy issues and how many people feel this is a big privacy slip up, while others just don't think so. What has been overlooken so far is how many business, design and technical mistakes were commited by Google on this ocassion. I've compiled several of those in the following article as it really makes you wonder what's happening behind Google's doors:

When shared means public and public means private

"Each tag you share will get its own public page and feed URL, the same way shared items has a public page and feed; these tags will not be shared with anyone unless you send them the public address." -- Official Google Reader blog

So "shared" posts that where previously private between you and your friends now will be published to everyone. If you want to keep something private you have to follow their documented too-many-clicks process and tag those same posts "public". Don't worry about the name, they will remain private, just how "shared" items worked previously. Is that clear enough for you?

If he sent you an e-mail two years ago he must be your friend

Google Reader will put in your "friends" list everyone you've exchanged mails with. They say "chat with", but that's not how it really works.

You can turn off this light, but you won't find the switch in this building

Do you want to stop any of your Google imposed friends prying at your Google Reader stuff ? You can do it, but Google Reader offers no controls do so. Instead you will have to pay a visit to another Google product - GMail - and there you will find the secret lever to stop this unwanted leak.

If she's not your friend you must delete her and never email she again

When you get to the GMail interface you will find a button to block someone from chat. That's what you always did when you wanted to keep someone's contact for e-mailing purposes, but you had no need to chat with them. Unfortunately that "block" behaviour won't block them from your Reader's shared stuff. The only way to stop it is deleting them. And if you ever exchange e-mails again, you'll have to keep repeating the motions.

"Additionally, please note that blocking a person in Google Talk doesn't remove them from your Reader friends list. They'll need to be actually deleted for this to happen." -- Google Reader official Guide

"I sold something to some stranger on eBay this past week, and now I'm receiving his shared feeds! And to avoid sharing my feeds I have to delete perfectly good contacts from my contacts list just because I don't want to share my reading material with them?" -- Carol, an user, answers.

Don't make me look at that

You might have shared nothing, but you might still be an innocent victim of this feature. Every time you log into Google Reader it will highlight all what your so called "friends" have shared. It might be pornography, violence or anything you just didn't ask to see. There is no filter in place for offensive stuff. The best you can do is react, but you can't proactively prevent it.

In the other hand, if you just want to annoy people Google has given you a great tool. Send people a couple of friendly e-mails, have them answered and you will be inside their Reader's interface. Now you can start having fun, and Google has not put any spam filter in place.

What does "hide" hide?

Once you have been offended by someone you can hide him. It won't stop him looking at your shared stuff, but at least you won't see his updates. Problem is that Google has created one of the most confusing interfaces I've seen lately to do so.

Look at the following screenshot (actual contacts renamed and/or removed):

Google gives you a list of your friends "that can see your shared items (and you can see theirs)". Next to each one you have a "Hide" button. Many people have thought that this is the control to hide your stuff from them, but it isn't so and there's no way to guess that from the interface. It will just hide them from what you see.

Note also that you can't proactively hide contacts that haven't shared until they do. So first they'll have to start sending you information you don't want to see. Only after you receive it you will be able to stop this happening.

It's your fault if you press the "yeah, whatever" button

Part of Google's defense is that they told you about this changes the first time you logged into Reader after they introduced this feature. Maybe they did, but they used a big annoying popup with text that blocked your normal use of the product. Maybe you were in a hurry, maybe you weren't paying attention, and maybe you just clicked on it without realizing all the consequences of this warning.

For example when I read it I realized something unwanted was happening, but didn't have time to fix it right at that moment and had to agree with the warning just to be able to continue using the product.

Google, how does this show respect and care for your users?

We told you unguessable urls where private, but what made you think this one was?

Many bloggers have noted that you can't expect privacy from an unguessable URL. The problem is that is the exact same mechanism Google uses to keep your stuff private in most of their products, including Reader, Picasa Web, Calendar, Docs, etc.

The problem with Google is that they have taught me to expect privacy with unguessable URLs, and I don't expect to have them shared unexpectedly by Google. Can I expect privacy for my calendars, documents, and pictures then? Or Google will just start sharing them with all my GMail contacts?

Creating spammers

If I want to sell something maybe I'd like telling all my GMail contacts about it, but I wouldn't do it as that would be spam. If I had shared a post about it now Google just spammed everyone with it, and guess who is getting the blame?

We really do value your feedback. We'll come next year see how your are coping with it.

When deploying new experimental services it's really a bad idea to do it on a Friday if you are not willing to come back to fix it on the weekend. That's what the Google Reader team just did when they deployed this feature at the of Friday, December 14th 2007. Worse than that, now it's January 2008, and they still haven't produced an acceptable answer as they mostly disappeared for the holidays. In fact there has been no official messages for the last 6 days.

Who wouldn't say that isn't a sign of poor planning?

If we learn from Facebook mistakes we should be able to repeat them

Facebook just had to face a similar drama when they released their Beacon feature. Only one month after it was released their CEO came forward, apologized and offered an opt-out button. Some people would say opt-out isn't good enough, and that these features should be opt-in, but at least Facebook users got an opt-out button. 18 days and loud complaints everywhere still haven't got Google Reader's users an opt-out button to go back to their previously comfortable state.

Can we repeat Microsoft sins then?

An important point on the verdict of the United States v. Microsoft case was that they were guilty of unlawfully tying products.

As the verdict said: Microsoft also violated Section 1 of the Sherman Act by unlawfully tying its Web browser to its operating system.

Almost every day Facebook, LinkedIn and many other sites with less reputation ask me for my e-mail contact list. I just won't give it to them. On one hand I value my contacts, and the other hand each of my social networks is different. Why then Google Reader can just grab without asking my Google Mail contact list? They are different products, and I don't want to tie them together.

As Google grows into a monopolistic position they'll too have to worry about unlawfully tying their products together to give them unfair advantages.

We won't use our own interfaces

Everyone knows Google wants to be social. They even created released the OpenSocial api so people can "build apps that easily interact with your friends and colleagues."

Why did they just ignore it?

Updated 2008-01-02: Rushed products

Google is known for their cautious deployments, extended beta periods, invitation only products, "go back to our old interface" buttons, etc. Surprisingly this time they just let the bull free. Even more astonishing has been their response, instead of taking the bull away they are just giving us instructions to handle it. "The bull has been freed, we are not taking it away, best get used to it. You should have seen the bull coming, any damages caused are your fault". -- Fh in "The new Google strategy behind their Reader debacle"

Yes, you are allowed to mistakes. In fact, you're supposed to make mistakes. But have some humillity, be willing to try different alternatives and learn quick from small experiments. Why annoy everyone, if you can manage to only annoy a small subset of your users and learn from that experience?

Closing words

I used to look up on Google just to follow their example on how to do things right. Not this time. It's amazing how many mistakes and goodwill have they burned with just one decision. While we count how many days they'll need to solve this case I compiled this list so other people can learn from their mistakes. Let's hope we remember Friday 2007-12-14 as the day Google did a really big mistake, and not as the start of a new Google era. If the latter, not everything will be lost, as they will be opening space for more privacy minded competitors to fill the void.

Help Google pay attention: Slashdot It!

The new Google strategy behind their Reader debacle

2007-12-28T07:25:00.001-03:00

First I thought this crisis was due to an arrogant intern or middle manager mistake. But it was so Google unlike it amazed me it could happen, or how long the violation has (still!) been unsolved.

But this article unveils this wasn't an operational mistake or a tactical one. It's 2008 Google's strategy, and it signals things to come. I'd love to know what internal structure changes made this possible.

The overall gist of the video is that Google wants to take its existing set of applications and integrate them around Google Reader. Google Reader will become, not just a way to track news items, but also where you can see what your friends are up to.

Now granted, you can already do that to some extent, but you need to set things up by hand. What Google would like to do is automate and streamline the process — as well as add more data to the mix.

This according to a leaked internal Google video. Details at wisebread.

If I had to guess I'd say Brin&Page finally realized they are very good at many things, but not at social software. Look at Google's product history if you want to check. This wasn't a big problem, as they could always buy Youtube or make a strategic deal with MySpace. But then Facebook came around, Microsoft and not Google got the deal, and desperate measures were needed. Finally B&P decided to take a step back and let someone else's criteria lead the war against Facebook. Badly. With the arrogance and results you have seen these two weeks.

Google is known for their cautious deployments, extended beta periods, invitation only products, "go back to our old interface" buttons, etc. Surprisingly this time they just let the bull free. Even more astonishing has been their response, instead of taking the bull away they are just giving us instructions to handle it. "The bull has been freed, we are not taking it away, best get used to it. You should have seen the bull coming, any damages caused are your fault".

What do you think?

Maybe we just have to wait for an anonymous Google employee to tell us the whole picture.

News continue rolling at Techmeme.

Google answers with persuasion, no real changes

2007-12-27T07:32:00.000-03:00

After 12 days of angry complaints and general controversy around the net Google gave an official response.

Problem is they are just repeating the same instructions that started this problem to begin with. There are many ways for stopping your content being pushed to your gmail contacts that use greader, but they all involve removing all your previously shared content (you can put it at a new feed, but then you'll have to make everyone update their links too). Or removing all your gmail contacts (yes, removing them and not writing e-mails to them again). Or just stop using their product. When I say there is no way to opt-out, it's because there still is no way to go back to how things worked for everyone two weeks ago.

So I wouldn't declare that Google understood the message yet. Their answer just reminds me some jedi mental tricks, as if they were saying "this is not a problem, no one had any conflicts due to the change we introduced". Sorry, there were problems, and people have been telling you about them since the first day.

As one user wrote in the forum after that non-response:

"Wow, Graham, I think I speak for many of the unhappy people who've posted in this thread when I say that this alleviates essentially NONE of our concerns. But you go ahead and keep thinking that you can somehow convince us that we like this change, instead of actually listening to, you know, what we have CLEARLY and REPEATEDLY said to you."

Some clarifications:

I said all your gmail contacts and not all your chat contacts as Google automatically adds everyone you've had e-mail conversations with to your gtalk contacts list. So it also depends on them using gmail and greader, but it doesn't involve chatting with them.

Some people say they don't have a problem with sharing their shared feed and publish their shared feed url. That's fine, I would do the same. The problem isn't that people can access the information, but that it gets automatically pushed to them. I can share articles, but I don't want to push them to everyone I had contact with, as that would be a rude form of spam. If they want to, they can subscribe, but please don't make them unsubscribe manually as that will hurt my relationship with them. Google, you are using my name and reputation to push content. Stop doing it. Please?

Say, another example. If someone puts a hidden camera in your shower and broadcasts it, maybe some people will be very happy. But you won't. It's not how many people are happy and how many aren't, but that you have a right to share your stuff with people who cares and not having it pushed to everyone. In this case Google message would be "Hey, you had a camera, we just told everyone about it. If you want this to stop you can remove the camera, even if you had it for other purposes before. We won't assure that this won't happen again". Even some people that start receiving these images don't want to, but thanks to Google they will start receiving each new transmission Google finds and each user will have to manually unsubscribe from them, one by one. With no way to stop them coming.

To end with an anecdote, WebMetrics Guru found an "embarrasing" use of this feature. Seems like an unaware professional started broadcasting his search for a new job. You might have been able to access that information before, but Google, you didn't have to tell everyone, did you?

And, yes, Google can do whatever they want with my data, as long as they respect the TOS. But this issue isn't about technical details. It's about trust, the expectations users had on them, and how they have been shattered by Google's newly developed arrogance.

For example, they can technically and legally delete all users emails from gmail, but if they did, you wouldn't except a nice reaction from people. Or more trust for Google.

Two buttons would had solved this whole drama: "Yes, I want to send my shared posts to all my gmail contacts", and "Yes, I want to receive shared post from all my gmail contacts". But Google just wanted to push hard. They assumed a yes, and there is no way to say no.

Google Reader shares private data, ruins Christmas

2007-12-26T21:19:00.000-03:00

Update 2007-12-28: Google's strategy discussion moved to a new post.

Update 2007-12-26: Update at the end of the article, answer to a comment.

Update 2007-12-26: Reactions from Scoble, Mashable, ParisLemon, more.

Update 2007-12-25: Got posted to /. homepage. The discussion continues there.

Original article:

As each day Google hoards more of your data there is an implicit deal that makes this possible: You give Google your private data, while they keep it private. That deal would fail miserably is someday Google decided unilaterally to share your data with more people. For example, with all your Gmail contacts. Many people fear that this might happen someday, but they don't need to wait anymore as it has already happened.

It all started on Friday, December 14. Towards the end of the day Google announced a new feature of their feed reader product: They were going to show all your "shared" items to all your Gmail contacts, starting now. No need to opt-in, no way to opt-out. If you didn't react fast all the info you previously shared with your chosen parties could be viewable by everyone you had exchanged e-mails (using Gmail data).

When Google Reader's team came back on Monday, they found more than 70 complaints in their public forum (you can check the whole thread). Given Google's fine reputation dealing with their users privacy (they really need this reputation to make their platform possible) people were expecting a quick fix and some kind of apollogy, but the official response was appalling. As one user said "wow. this is a politician's answer....i.e. answers that don't address our specific questions/complaints".

More than one week has passed, and there still is no acceptable stop to this private data leak caused by the new Google Reader "feature".

Some of the complaints users have posted:

Dec 14: "This is the worst "feature" you have ever introduced."

Dec 14: "I think the basic mistake here, as Modulo has noted, is that the people on my contact list are not necessarily my "friends"."

Dec 15: "This "feature" sucks big-time. How do I turn it off?"

Dec 15: "This is a terrible idea, and a violation of privacy, and it contradicts your own documentation". "Please don't turn the best feed reader on the web into the shittiest social network on the web."

Dec 15: "I WAS using the shared feed for myself as a way to backup important RSS feeds, not to share with people I hardly know who happen to be in my address book."

Dec 15: "Our problem with the feature isn't the feature itself, but that they automatically changed from an opt-in feature to an opt-out feature that you can't disable"

Dec 15: "Please fix this and let us OPT IN to who we want to share with. PLEASE. Don't make me leave my Google apps!!"

Dec 15: "I have parents, relatives, business associates, all who use gmail, in my contact list, and the only way to not share with them is to remove the contact? That's INSANE."

Dec 15: "It was quite a shock this morning when I opened Google Reader only to be told that my "friends" could see what feed I'm subscribed to."

Dec 15: "That forces me to either remove the contact or clear my shared list which feels like two opposite ends of the spectrum."

Dec 15: "Google Reader is a pleasure to use - PLEASE don't trash it with these adolescent networking gimmicks."

Dec 15: "This feels like a decision made by some 23 year old Google employee who thinks everyone wants to be on the latest social networking craze that all of his friends like."

Dec 15: "For the last year I have used my obfuscated share URL for sharing market research with a small handful of trusted colleagues. I have over 700 shared items which represent one of the most thorough catalogues of discourse about a very particular market in my industry. Its absolutely intolerable to me that now all of my industry contacts (competitors) who are also gmail contacts will be able to mine this information as well as piece together fragments of other initiatives I've been considering."

Dec 16: "Aside from all of the other reasons that people have already listed as to why this is a horrible feature and gross invasion of privacy, the most egregious thing I've seen is that all of my contacts were now able to see my full first and last name -- despite the fact that I hid my last name in my gmail account -- because I used both when I signed up for my google account."

Dec 17: "Up until now, I have used the share feature to share things with a select group of friends. This implementation, giving me the option to either remove all my shared items (over 2000!) or share those items with ALL my contacts is terrible!"

Dec 17: "Was Google jealous of all that publicity Facebook got with the Beacon fiasco or something?"

Dec 17: "It just shouldn't be shoved down anyone's throat. I'd rather selectively browse my Friends' feeds than be automatically inundated with them, and it should be an active choice to push these feeds to groups of people in the first place. This feature was introduced in a rather ham-handed fashion, and you seem to be alienating quite a few people."

Dec 17: "I ask Google: what was the point of the obfuscated URL in the first place? Haven't you completely negated that point by this implementation?"

Dec 17: "I DO NOT want people in my old company seeing what news items are being shared in my new company."

Dec 17: "Making this feature an all or nothing option isn't in the best interest of people who've used this feature in their own individual ways over the years. It forces us to use this only as google has decided we should and that sucks."

Dec 17: "The old system was very simple to use, adding a button to share with Google Talk contacts faster might have been nice. But total broadcasting whether you want to or not...that's just wrong."

Dec 17: "Prior to this new rollout it was EXPLICIT that the share URLs were obfuscated and that there was a reasonable degree of privacy - security through obscurity. Google explicitly warned against sharing these PRIVATE urls with untrusted parties."

Dec 17: "This is a very urgent need in order to regain confidence in Google Reader's respect for privacy."

Dec 17: "I find the "social networkization" of Google's services unattractive, and unfortunately, I can't really opt-out of them."

Dec 17: "Can you imagine surprise when someone decides to share NSFW item, for example? No way to disable this feature completely and no way to pre-opt-out."

Dec 17: "Why are there "friends" showing up on my list who I've neither chatted with in GTalk nor are in my Gmail contacts list? When I google the email address in question, it shows up on all sorts of spam blogs. "

Dec 17: "That is patently false. I have NEVER used Google Talk. I use Gmail for email only. Everyone on my Gmail contacts list who also uses Google Reader -- none of whom I have ever chatted with -- was on my Friends list, "

Dec 18: "You may not care about my feedback. I've already left Reader."

Dec 18: "It is discouraging that they try to clear up misconceptions about the new feature without really addressing our problem with it."

Dec 18: "Your choice of tactics to mollify the anger over this choice with soft words rather than decisive action to fix the problem is now the second mistake that has been made in this growing fiasco."

Dec 18: "What's even more annoying, is someone popped up as a "friend" today, who isn't even in my contact list. How the hell did THAT happen? I moderate an online community and I don't particularly want people I've had to remove from that community all of a sudden popping up on my reader feeds and the like. This is a terrible, terrible feature."

Dec 18: "I don't have much else to add other than to say that the Google response to this is utterly dissatisfying."

Dec 18: "I'm complaining because the articles I shared with my wife are now shared with my entire contact list, with no warning. In fact, this is precisely the worst sort of violation of privacy."

Dec 18: "I can almost see how they'd negligently fail to see the problems that this feature would cause. But now, after a huge outcry, their failure to fix the problem is reckless and unprofessional."

Dec 18: "This is not true. My "friends" list includes contacts I have never chatted with and have subsequently blocked and/or removed."

Dec 18: "It seems clear that by making things "public" by any definition, you are giving Google the option of choosing to publish it for you, to whomever they want (including your own contacts)."

Dec 18: "So, the recommendation from Google is to stop using Reader the way we each of us have decided was useful to us and to start using it the Google-Approved way?"

Dec 19: "Please please pretty please make this an opt-in feature as well! I think it's pretty apparent that a lot of us who use the sharing feature have adapted it for our own purposes, and what you've done has simply broken how we work."

Dec 19: "Making something public is not the same as publishing it. Publishing it is not the same as publicizing it. You've jumped a whole lot of people right to a stage they hadn't ever volunteered for. "

Dec 19: "I have to admit ... I removed someone from my Gmail contacts list as suggested, but they still appear as a "friend" in Google Reader. This is not yet working as documented."

Dec 19: "Also, I just found out that when I migrated my shared history to the new tag for my bf, all the (1000+) items showed up as new. Annoying!"

Dec 19: "I have an anonymous blog that benefits from posting shared articles, but now I have to remove them because there seems to be no way to disable this. "

Dec 19: "It really makes me sad how you are handling this situation." "This problem is solvable. I'm just counting how many days it will take for someone to acknowledge a mistake has been done."

Dec 20: "Isn't it a bit ironic that they are publicizing this as a way they are protecting our privacy in one service, and yet it was taken away from us in Google Reader without any warning? "

Dec 20: "This feature is ill conceived and ruins normal usage. Please disable it as soon as possible. "

Dec 20: "Please take into account that not everyone uses google talk and do not force those of us who do not to use it to opt out."

Dec 20: "At this point, the response from Google makes us feel as though we're talking to a child who insists that LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU! "

Dec 20: "I feel like I'm talking to a wall here. This whole thing is a horrible mess."

Dec 21: "no wait, that doesn't address our concerns at all. can we speak with your manager or something? you clearly aren't addressing our concerns at all, and this has become comical."

Dec 22: "Trust takes a hell of a lot of effort to build and very little effort to piss away. By not giving us that checkbox you have pissed away a large amount of trust that I and the other unsatisfied people here had."

Dec 22: "Generally, when you have a group of angry people complaining about having their privacy violated it's probably not a good idea to dismiss them as "a small subset" to their faces."

Dec 22: "I've just joined this group to post to this thread. I'm sure others have too. Consider the fact that almost every post in the ~150 replies you have received *does not like* the feature. I'd call that a fair representation."

Google's response has included:

Dec 17: "There's a "clear your shared items" link on the Settings > Friends page if you urgently need to remove the items you've shared in the past."

Dec 18: "We just added a new option for those of you wishing to rearrange your sharing habits in light of the new features."

Dec 19: "Additionally, please note that blocking a person in Google Talk doesn't remove them from your Reader friends list. They'll need to be actually deleted for this to happen."

Dec 20: Nothing

Dec 21: "This should help with the issue of unrecognized nicknames."

Dec 21: "Let me reiterate: If you're uncomfortable sharing items, you can unshare everything in a single click"

And one last user, that gives the title to this post:

Dec 22: "This is going to sound like hyperbole, but this new feature has actually RUINED CHRISTMAS for my family! ..."

Is this a sign of things to come? Will Google decide on its own when you have to be more social? What you want to share and with whom? No way to opt-out? Because that's what happening right now.

Update 2007-12-25: Got posted to /. homepage. The discussion continues there.

Update 2007-12-26: Answer to a comment:

We both agree on facts, we just hold a different opinion on them. I'll stop using some words so we can find where we do agree. If you don't agree with any point, please tell me, I'm interested.

First, it's not the end of the world. We both agree on this. But it could signal the start of a trend that leads to the end of Google as we know it (it could happen, it has happened to other giants before). They need trust, without it people won't give them their data.

For example, we can agree that there are a lot of angry people thanks to this feature. You can count them, so it is a fact. You can start with me if you want. For example, I wrote a couple of articles in a medium traffic spanish blog recommending Google Reader. Now I'll have to change it and write a new one. The underlying message will be "I'm sorry I recommended G.R., I don't trust them anymore, use this other product instead". You might disagree on my reasons for doing so, but I am not the only one that feels this way, and just because of this new feature. As Warren Buffett would say "If you lose money I will be understanding, but if you lose reputation I'll be ruthless". There is a lost of Google's reputation here, even if you don't think there should be.

Let's continue with the instructions to stop the unwanted result of this feature avoided. Let's say I follow the instructions we both read and that you just repeated on your post. I'll delete all my previously shared content, I'll re-tag it, I'll change that tag to "public", I'll get a new feed url, I'll write all my friends I previously shared content with and tell them "please, you'll have to delete the old url and add this new one", they will all comply and then everything will work as it was working two weeks ago. It's a lot of effort, but you think it's reasonable, and I won't argue with that for now. But what would happen next?

You see, I followed the instructions and marked a tag as "public". What will stop Google sharing that tag with all my e-mail contacts in the future? Because that's just what they did now. They took something I used one way and they started broadcasting it just because it said "shared". Why won't they use the same arguments for something that says "public"?

Update 2007-12-26: Reactions from Scoble, Mashable, ParisLemon, more.

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