Google Snooping?

Last week I needed a link to some OSGi site so as I usually do I typed it in the Firefox google box and copied the link. Huh? The link turned out to be some garbled mess, quite unlike the link shown in the message status area. Hmm, guess I had copied wrong, went back, verified the status bar, was correct, and copied the link again. Again a garbled mess, though I now noticed it started with www.google.com and contained the link as a parameter. On closer inspection I found that the URL was actually going through google before it went to the actual site.

This kind of upsets me. I remember telling google not to keep track of my clicks anonymously. I definitely do not want it to keep track of my clicks, not anonymously and definitely not when I am logged in. And that is definitely the case. When you are not logged in, a link goes directly to the destination site. When logged in, you go via google. Not only would I never agree to this consciously (I am pretty sure I clicked on some yady yada because I trusted Google), I am also upset about the extra time it takes to send a message to google, get back the redirect and then finally go to the real website. From my home location, it easily adds half a second per page. What web acceleration?

Bad Google! I just had laughed at the conspiracy theory that was circulated that Google was founded by the NSA. An attractive theory because it would be incredibly clever! I still think the NSA is clever enough to not to such a move, however, I am disappointed in Google. So far this company has always impressed me by their motto of "do no evil", or at least, "do the least amount of evil". Their press in this area has been pretty good so far. This was a big disappointment Larry and Sergey!

I should start using one of the other search engines, however, they do provide a tremendous value. I guess when I do not log in, their links are straight. Maybe I give them another chance.

   Peter Kriens

P.S. People brought to my attention that you can disable the web history if you want. However, I was never asked and even if you disable it, it will still contact Google for every click. Still bad, maybe even worse because it looks like you can control it.