Google's +1 for Chrome follows your Internet travels

KnowYourMeme.com

By Helen A.S. Popkin

The Google +1?icon is popping up across the Internet, one more button to click in the area where you go to?Like, Tweet, Stumble, Share, etc., ?or comment on webpage. But it's still not everywhere ? unless, you're using Google's Chrome browser. Yesterday, with no fanfare, the Google+ Button extension appeared in the Chrome Web Store, bringing you the ability to +1 a webpage, even if the site doesn't include +1 button in its sharing options.

The +1 Chrome extension allows you to see the total number of +1 counts a webpage has received, but unlike the +1 icons embedded in webpages, a +1 clicked through Chrome doesn't post that item in your Google+ account.?Once you've added the +1 extension to Chrome however, it does send the URL you've visited back to Google ? whether you've +1'd those webpages or not.

According to the +1 app description,"In addition to the practices described in the Google +1 Button Privacy Policy, by installing this extension, all of the pages and URLs you visit will be sent to Google in order to retrieve +1 information."

Creepy, but unsurprising given that according to?Google chairman Eric Schmidt, Google+ isn't so much a social network but an "identity service," demanding your real name so it can use your info to improve its products, and that part that goes unsaid, ramp up its targeted marketing.

Google explains what the +1 Chrome extension does with your info it's collecting in the Privacy Guide section titled ? I kid you not ??How the +1 button respects your privacy.

As for those +1 buttons spreading? the Internet, "Google is making plans to turn its +1 button into a crowdsourcing tool that helps it re-order search results and fight web spam," Wired?reported earlier this week. "While not surprising, the move would bring Google's search engine into the social networking era, while simultaneously creating a new avenue for blackhats to manipulate search results and potentially incurring the wrath of trust-busting authorities."

So you've got that to look forward to, too!

??via TechCrunch

More on the annoying way we live now:

?Helen A.S. Popkin?goes blah blah blah about the Internet. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook.?Also, Google+.

Source: http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/09/01/7557758-googles-1-chrome-exstension-follows-your-internet-travels

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