I’m having a real problem with Google these days. As anyone using blogger.com knows, Google bought Blogger a few years ago. Now Google is forcing us bloggers to switch our sites over to the Blogger Beta version. This is not that big a deal, except for the fact that in order to do this, YOU MUST HAVE A GOOGLE ACCOUNT.
I was going to try to switch over shortly after they started sending polite suggestions that we do so, but could not get past the first step; setting up a Google account, which means giving Google all of my personal information, which I absolutely do not want to do.
So, in order to continue this site, I will be FORCED to give Google whatever information they request. I’m not sure what his will mean for people who want to comment. I don’t know if users who only have a profile (but no blog) will have to update to a Google account or not. Probably so. The Sister tried to do this last week. She wanted to leave a comment, but wanted a little avatar by her name. I told her in order to do this she’d have to create a profile with Blogger. No big deal. What I didn’t know was, that in order to even create just a profile, you now had to open a Google account. I DON’T LIKE THIS.
While I use and enjoy the Google search engine and Google Image Search (which I use all the time), using those two features is still pretty anonymous. Oh I know they’re keeping a log of all the searches, but the searchers themselves are anonymous, more or less. I resent and am struggling with purposely giving Google any more of my personal info than they already have.
I know a lot of you who swing by here are also blogger.com users. How do you all feel about it? Have any of you switched to the new Beta version yet? Are the new features they promise in the Beta version really anything to write home about? While I agree that Blogger needs an update, and it certainly could stand some major improvements, I don’t like getting all tangled up in Google World in order to be able to use it.
I am convinced that if I give Google even one more piece of information, it will become self-aware. And the next thing you know, we’ll all need The Terminator to come and save us.
13 comments:
You can always lie when providing that info. It's the one big weakness about the information they receive...accuracy.
I've also noticed some people are switching over to other tools in place of Blogger.
This is also interesting concerning all that "information".
If you'd like another reason to be troubled by Google, despite the wide variety of special banners to commemmorate this day or that, and despite annual petitions to do so, they have yet to display one for Memorial Day.
I was putting off switching since it gave a warning that my old blogs wouldn't be accessible anymore to editing. But now that warning is gone and it says the blogs I have wouldn't change in layout or style.
I'm not sure what info they ask for in getting a Google account, is it anymore than what you gave for a Blogger account? I haven't heard of anyone complaining about the info they ask for in getting Gmail, so I doubt it's anything very in depth. I'm not sure what you're worried about.
Alex has a point about accuracy, since dummy accounts are most likely created all the time. I has several disposable email addresses to deal with spam that use that principle
I have "disposable" email accounts too. Several of them. Works like a charm.
I think in order to change over to the new blogger; they make you open an email account. I don’t know what else they want because I never got past that step. And I didn’t think about a dummy account because I assumed that the info would have to match up with whatever info blogger has now. Maybe I just don’t like being forced into it.
I’ve heard both good and bad things about gmail. Do they put ads in the emails? I thought I heard that they scan the email and search for keywords and then place pertinent ads in.
As fas as Memorial Day goes, I find it really hard to believe that they don’t do a logo for that holiday. They do one for everything else. I even saw a logo for that Burning Man festival they have out in the west. But a lot of these are user-made and have nothing to do with Google. I just checked my stock of Google logos (I thought I had them all) and you’re right, there is nothing for Memorial Day. I have over 200 logos and nothing. How very strange, why do you think that is?
Ok, so nobody has changed over to the new Beta yet? I’m still getting polite suggestions to switch over. I hate change….
I'm resisting the change and even wrote about it last week. It seems a couple of us are in a contest to be the last bloggers to make the change over. A friend who changed his blog yesterday, found the blog off-line the whole day.
I'm a contributor of 5 Blogger blogs and owner of two of those and haven't received a notification at all.
Each year there's a group that petitions Google to do a Memorial Day logo. They even provide a suggested logo so no one at Google has to do any mroe than cut and paste. Three years of that and still no go.
Sage, I’m going to join your little contest. I’m going to wait until they either threaten to shut me down or until Google sends one of the Machines over to my house to persuade me. I think the last notice said we had about 2 months.
RTO, that’s amazing. Did Google give you a reason? Did you petition Google’s logo creator, Dennis Hwang (Hwang Jung-moak)? Perhaps he’d be more reasonable. We have 5 months; perhaps we can get together and try it again this year? I’d be interested to know why they resist the idea.
I'm up for that, I didn't want to change mine either since I didn't want what I had done to be screwed up. So is it going to be kind of a "Master of your Domain" contest like they had on that episode of Seinfeld?
We are so NOT doing the Master of your Domain thing! :>
So I guess that means that Sage will win, since he'll be the last one that doesn't change to Google
I'm not changing til everyone else does!
This is what they're saying now:
Update, 12/20: "If you don’t see the “Switch Now” button on the homepage, it’s because a ton of people are already switching to the new Blogger, and we only let so many run simultaneously in order to give everyone a good experience. Just log in to old Blogger for now, and we’ll give you a heads up on your Dashboard when we’re ready for you."
That doesn't sound too promising to me. This morning I received my "heads up" that they are now ready for me.
They're just going to have to say ready.
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