Bennett Haselton: Google+ To Gmail Controversy Missing the Point

Bennett Haselton writes "Google created controversy by announcing that Google+ users will now be able to send email to Gmail users even without having those Gmail users' email addresses. I think this debate misses the point, because it's unlikely to create a deluge of unsolicited email to Gmail users, as long as Google can throttle outgoing messages from Google+ users and terminate abusive accounts. The real controversy should be over the fact that Google+ users can search a public database of the names of all Gmail users in the first place. And limiting the ability of Google+ users to write to those Gmail accounts, won't do anything to address that." Read below to see what Bennett has to say.

To begin with, remember that on Facebook (which I no longer use, but which I keep up with) does allow you to search for other members' names and send them messages even if they have not yet accepted your friend request. Facebook users are generally not shy when it comes to complaining about problems with the site, but I've never heard Facebook users complaining about junk messages from strangers. (It's true that if you get a message from a user outside of your friends list, it gets routed to the "Other" folder of your Facebook inbox. But similarly, Google says that messages from strangers on Google+ will get routed to a Gmail user's "Social" tab of the inbox.)

So I expect the amount of actual unsolicited emails from Google+ users to Gmail users to be almost a complete non-issue, for the same reason that it's not an issue on Facebook. I assume the reason that Facebook users get so few junk messages, is that Facebook can limit the number of outgoing messages sent per day by any one account (although I don't know what that limit is), and can shut down accounts that are reported for abuse. Yes, a spammer could continually create new accounts to send more messages, but if you create too many Facebook accounts from the same IP address, and each account created from that IP address gets flagged for abuse, Facebook might start disallowing new accounts created from that IP. You could switch your IP address continually, but at a certain point, spammers must have decided that creating disposable Facebook accounts for spamming purposes wasn't worth the trouble, because the simple fact is that they don't do it. So Gmail users are not in danger of buried in spam from Google+ accounts. (By contrast, conventional email spam grew to unmanageable proportions because anybody with an email server could send out millions of messages per day, unless their provider cut them off.)

On the other hand, I think we should be more concerned about the fact that anyone who creates a Gmail address automatically has a Google+ account created for them. This doesn't just mean that any of Google's claims about the "number of Google+ users" are inflated, if they're including everyone who signs up for a Gmail account. (That's a valid complaint, but it's between Google and their shareholders, since the rest of us don't need to care how many users Google+ actually has.) More importantly, it means that all of those users become part of a public database that is searchable by name.

As a test, I went to Gmail.com and created a new user account, entering the first and last name "Zanzibar Higglesbrain" which I figured was probably unique. (Fan fiction authors: knock yourselves out.) Then I logged back in under my own Google+ account, went to the people search page, searched for "Zanzibar Higglesbrain", and found 1 match. (I didn't even need the exact name -- entering "Zanzibar Hi" into the people search box, listed Mr. Higglesbrain among the results.)

Now, when I created the Higglesbrain account, how much up-front notice was I given that I would be adding myself to a public database? I went through the normal signup process, viewed through the eyes of a novice -- after typing in Gmail.com, I was redirected to a page on accounts.google.com with the innocuous title "Create your Google Account", and entered my personal information. On the next page is the somewhat confusingly worded message (I've also posted a screen shot here):

How you'll appear

Choose how you appear across Google by creating a public Google+ profile.
Include a photo - you can update it at any time.
[Link:] Add a photo
[Button:] Next step

This message is misleadingly worded because the phrase "by creating a public Google+ profile" implies that's something you can do, optionally, if you want to. It doesn't really disclose the fact that the profile is being created for you as a side effect of signing up for Gmail. The wording might be interpreted, rather, to mean that your profile will only be created if you upload a photo (which is not the case; your profile gets created regardless). And besides -- what if the user is a novice who went to Gmail.com because they saw all their friends using Gmail.com addresses, and have never even heard of "Google+"? If they haven't consented to their name being added to a publicly searchable database, it shouldn't be their responsibility to know what "Google+" is, so that they can object to their name being listed there.

After you click the "Next step" button, the final page in the account creation process says:

Welcome, [firstname]

Your new email address is [address]

Thanks for creating a Google Account. Use it to subscribe to channels on YouTube, video chat for free, save favorite places on Maps, and lots more.

Note what's conspicuously missing from this message: It doesn't mention Google+ at all, much less the fact that you have unwittingly "joined" it, where other users can find you.

I can think of a couple of scenarios where a user might object to their name being listed in a searchable user database, apart from just "on general principles". If you have a stalker in your past, and they find your name on Google+, it confirms for them that you're probably still alive, that you're probably active on the Internet, and that you're still going by the name that they knew you under. Or, if you have a very unique first name, anyone who knows it could search on Google+ to find your last name, even if you didn't want them to. Similarly, if you have a very unique last name, someone could use the search feature to find the names of your children and other relatives with the same last name, at least those of them that are using Gmail.

And this lack of user consent is a more serious problem on Gmail/Google+ than on Facebook, because most Facebook users create a profile with the general expectation that other Facebook users can find them. Some Facebook users had chosen not to make their accounts searchable -- and Facebook justifiably received a firestorm of criticism for removing that feature and forcing those users' profiles to become publicly searchable after all -- but the overwhelming majority of Facebook users had joined with the understanding that their profiles could be found by others. That's not a valid assumption about Gmail users -- if someone creates a Gmail.com email address, there's no reason to think that they believed they were joining a publicly searchable name database.

Google has tried to mollify people's concerns about emails from strangers on Google+, by specifying that anyone not already in your Google+ circles will only be able to send one message to your Gmail inbox, and will not be able to send more messages until you reply. But this misunderstands the privacy implications in, for example, the stalker scenario. If a stalker ex "Bob" really did find your name on Google+, they might try to tease out a reply by creating a Google+ account under the name of a friend "Alice" you and your ex had in common, and sending you a generic "How have you been doing lately?" message. Since that message probably won't raise any alarm bells (the message isn't asking for anything like a current address or phone number), you might not realize that just by replying, you've already done the damage (the stalker now knows your email address, plus the fact that it's still an actively used account).

Similarly, although you can modify your Gmail settings to prevent strangers on Google+ from messaging you, the ability to change a setting to fix a problem only helps a user if the user realizes when the problem is happening. For example, if the problem resulting from this new feature switch were a deluge of spam from strangers on Google+, then more and more users would get frustrated and look for information about how to stop the flood of spam, and most of them would find out about this setting and switch it off. But for combatting the stalker problem, this setting is useless, because by definition if a stalker finds you on Google+ (and tricks you into replying to a message and revealing your email address), you wouldn't know about that problem until the damage has already been done, at which point it's too late to solve it by changing a setting.

The only way to avoid this risk to people's privacy, would be for Google to ask Gmail users at the time they create a Gmail account: "Do you also want to create a Google+ account, yes or no? This means you will have a publicly searchable profile, and people who know your name will be able to find you." Some people would like to be found, some people would rather not be, and this would allow them to sort themselves properly.

But instead, we have an untold number of zombie Google+ accounts created whenever someone signs up for Gmail, which serve no purpose except to make it possible to find people who never confirmed that they wanted to be found -- all most likely for the reason given by Chris Taylor at Mashable, so that "Larry Page gets to claim increased Google+ user numbers on the next quarterly earnings call."

Comments

Bennett Haselton?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who is Bennett Haselton, and why do we care what he says?

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[tomhath]

If you want to know who he is, just look him up on Google+

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[Kerstyun]

He sure is one wordy gentalman.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[LordLimecat]

Look at his past submissions if you want to know.

Myself, Im partial to the one where he asked whether we REALLY need the 4th and 5th amendments.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[Dcnjoe60]

If you want to know who he is, just look him up on Google+

Better yet, look him up on Google+ and send him an email. After all, he states that this linking of Google+ and Gmail won't cause an increase of unsolicited email.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[Anonymous Coward]

He's Slashdot's volunteer opinion columnist.

I have no idea why he bothers; it's not like they're paying him.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[berashith]

he was kind enough to sign up with an even more peculiar name if you want to find him . email Zanzibar Higglesbrain to send to his "private" unknown account.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[cayenne8]

I guess those of us who have gmail and youtube account, were exempted from G+ account creation?

Youtube has from time to time prompted me to put in for a G+ account, but I just keep refusing.

By the by...who actually puts their REAL name on there when creating a gmail account?

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[Curunir_wolf]

I don't know, but this Zanzibar Higglesbrain sounds like a guy whose G+ feed I would like to follow!

Good idea! I also went ahead and uploaded my picture of Zanzibar, and tagged him!

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[LateArthurDent]

If you want to know who he is, just look him up on Google+

Better yet, look him up on Google+ and send him an email. After all, he states that this linking of Google+ and Gmail won't cause an increase of unsolicited email.

That's going to inconvenience him about as much as spam mail in the spam folder, considering all the e-mail people send is going to be automatically filed away to the social folder. Your post ended up proving his point that people don't actually understand how the feature work.

I was somewhat pissed off that Google made accepting those e-mails the default in the google+ settings, but I can see why some people would turn it on. In any case, anyone can turn it off.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[bennetthaselton]

I never wrote anything questioning the Fourth Amendment.

Actually, if you read the original article:
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/13/06/07/1439220/seeking-fifth-amendment-defenders
and scroll down to the paragraph beginning, "Compare that to the collateral damage caused by, for example, a search warrant," it should be clear that I think the potential harm to innocents caused by a search of one's property, is greater than the potential for harm in asking, "Did you do it?", and that if anything we need stronger protection against searches.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[bennetthaselton]

It's quality, not quantity. But he's getting better.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[Dcnjoe60]

That's going to inconvenience him about as much as spam mail in the spam folder, considering all the e-mail people send is going to be automatically filed away to the social folder.

(snip)

I was somewhat pissed off that Google made accepting those e-mails the default in the google+ settings, but I can see why some people would turn it on. In any case, anyone can turn it off.

That is true, however, unless his social folder is somehow different than the normal one, it won't discriminate against those he might want to see and the junk ones. So either the folder fills up and he ignores everything in it or he just shuts it off. Either way, it is a simple way to show how the decision could be abused. If the only recourse is to turn it off, then why turn it on in the first place?

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[cayenne8]

If you have a Gmail account, you have a Google+ account. I don't know about old YouTube accounts.

Hmm...lessee, the gmail account is approx. 7-8 years old I'd guess. It has no real information on me, name, etc.

Since they didn't have me set up a G+ account ever, how would I lot onto G+ to check to see if I am on G+?

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[Hognoxious]

It's quality, not quantity.

The polar opposite of your stories then, you rambling windbag.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[sh00z]

If you have a Gmail account, you have a Google+ account. I don't know about old YouTube accounts.

I was able to keep mine separate until I decided to watch a pay-per-view movie on YouTube, then I needed a Google Play account (which, of course, is tied to gmail and G+).

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[MaskedSlacker]

Those of us who use it for things connected to our real lives?

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[RespekMyAthorati]

Some asshole buddy of samzenpus.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[RespekMyAthorati]

More specifically, check out the "Fail" section at the end of this: Take the Fifth

It will also show why this semi-literate asshole is so loathed by slashdotters, despite the fact that samzempus apparently has the hots for him.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[RespekMyAthorati]

And your argument makes no fucking sense.
The fifth amendment is to prevent the authorities from beating a confession out of you, obviously.
If you didn't have your head up your ass, you would have realized this.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[bennetthaselton]

This is incorrect. The right against physical coercion is separate from the right to refuse to answer questions.

As I said in the original article, the proof of this is that if you are a third-party witness, you cannot refuse to answer questions about a crime about which you may have been a witness (but are not a suspect). The Fifth Amendment does not apply. But, obviously, you still can't be beaten up by the police. Because that right is separate from the Fifth Amendment.

I explained this in the original article. Judging from the comments, many people just scrolled to the bottom and started typing without reading it.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[alva_edison]

This is incorrect. The right against physical coercion is separate from the right to refuse to answer questions.

The right to refuse to answer questions also includes a right not to be physically coerced.

As I said in the original article, the proof of this is that if you are a third-party witness, you cannot refuse to answer questions about a crime about which you may have been a witness (but are not a suspect).

Unless you would incriminate yourself (key word) by answering. It doesn't even have to be for the same crime, you can refuse to answer any question as long as it would incriminate you.

But, obviously, you still can't be beaten up by the police. Because that right is separate from the Fifth Amendment.

You are assuming mutual exclusivity when there is none. Laws overlap. There are laws which prevent police from beating people, which apply to everyone; but, the Fifth Amendment also prevents physical coercion, which isn't necessarily redundant.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[bennetthaselton]

The problem is that you then can't ask the suspect questions that are relevant. For example, suppose there's incontrovertible proof that the suspect was in the room at the time of a shooting, but he claims he didn't do it.

What's a good reason why we can't just ask the suspect (and require an answer): "OK, if you didn't do it, what did you see?" If they're lying, they might get caught, and if they're not lying, their answer might contain useful information.

Subject to the obvious constraints: They can't be tortured (obviously), they can't be required to answer "the way we want them to" (obviously), they can't be punished for "lying" in their answer unless the court can prove that they lied (under the same standard of proof as any other criminal act), etc.

Re:Bennett Haselton?

[BlackHawk-666]

People who want to use it as a well known public address for others to send mail to them, like me. I've had a gmail account under my real name since the early days when it was invite only. I make that address public on my blog, web sites, quite a few forums, etc.

Despite the fact it should now be in every spammers database in the world I get almost no spam at the address thanks to the spam filters.

I have Gmail / YouTube / Google+ / Twitter / Facebook all in my real name. It's never been an issue, and in fact it's an advantage since I tend not to act like a complete fuckwad or douchebag on those accounts.

Given you can just opt out of the google+ thing, I really don't see any reason to even care.

Google plus

[sTERNKERN]

Just make it stop. I go to G-Mail to send mails, I go to Youtube to watch videos. If I wanted to socialize, I would have gone to Twitter/SnapChat/Facebook/MySpace (is there still such a thing?)/SecondLife... Google was famous for it's tools being simple, powerful and not forcing anything on the user. Good old days, eh?

Re:Google plus

[TrentTheThief]

I agree with your views. Google has jumped the damned shark.

Re:Google plus

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only is G+ not forced upon you, at all, but it's one of the easiest social services to delete your account from, removing ALL your history (every post, every reply, every picture, every single trace of your existence). And to top it off, it allows you, before you delete your account, to download a .zip file of all your posts, if you want.

Re:Google plus

[Arker]

"Not only is G+ not forced upon you, at all, but it's one of the easiest social services to delete your account from, removing ALL your history (every post, every reply, every picture, every single trace of your existence). And to top it off, it allows you, before you delete your account, to download a .zip file of all your posts, if you want."

Says the AC with no link.

IT certainly has been forced on me and if there is an option to delete it short of deleting my accounts on gmail and youtube (which seem to have been merged without my consent) in the process it's far from obvious.

Re:Google plus

[gl4ss]

haha that's like saying that you're not forced to give the government your photo.

sure you're not. unless you want to drive.

anyways, all this shit is pretty much because nobody wanted to use google+ - but some jackasses had their bonuses tied to the user numbers, so those jackasses then made it so that if you want to use youtube, you'll be a google+ user - and now every new gmail user is a google+ user.

they're just playing a stupid numbers game. this wouldn't even be a problem if they had not along the way fucked up youtube comments(and moderation of them) etc while doing it.

Re:Google plus

[Andrewkov]

If I wanted to socialize, I would have gone to Twitter/SnapChat/Facebook/MySpace

There's the rub (from google's perspective)

Re:Google plus

[Dcnjoe60]

I agree with your views. Google has jumped the damned shark.

Or, maybe, Google is the shark, a lean, mean, killing machine, devouring everything in it's way.

Re:Google plus

[Obfuscant]

I've already stopped using google search because they pushed too far. Gmail is next on the chopping block if they don't cut it out.

If only it were that easy for all.

My ISP has outsourced its email service to Gmail, and when it did so it sent them a couple of YEARS of DELETED email -- or at least email I thought I had deleted. And then I got stuck in the circle of trying to delete it from Gmail, and their asinine insults about "why do you want to delete anything when you've got so much space to keep it all?"

The University has now outsourced the undergraduate email system to Gmail. I'm expecting the staff email follows very soon, if the Uni can get around the public records/management of personal information laws that are currently keeping them from it.

Re:Google plus

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps you'd like to try our g-shark service?

Do I have to have a G+ profile to use Gshark? Is Gshark in beta? Will it be killed before ever leaving beta? Tune in next week to find out!

Re:Google plus

[houghi]

I have dropped my Gmail account and have gone to http://gmx.com/
For video upload, I will be using Vimeo instead of Youtube.

And the sole reason is the push they want to give to Google+ and the sneakiness they use to let you click to be connected to Google+

Watching video's, I still do. I now use Unique Youtube Skin to have a much better layout and not have the mobies play automagically,. so I can open several tabs and watch them one after the other.

Re:Google plus

[Dishevel]

I am just wondering how this guy was confused about how putting something on the internet was not 100% private.

I think he confused himself so that he would have something to write about. As far as I can tell there is no story here.

Attention! If put a name on the internet people can find it!

Re:Google plus

[atriusofbricia]

"Not only is G+ not forced upon you, at all, but it's one of the easiest social services to delete your account from, removing ALL your history (every post, every reply, every picture, every single trace of your existence). And to top it off, it allows you, before you delete your account, to download a .zip file of all your posts, if you want."

Says the AC with no link.

IT certainly has been forced on me and if there is an option to delete it short of deleting my accounts on gmail and youtube (which seem to have been merged without my consent) in the process it's far from obvious.

Odd, I was able to search and find a delete your google plus link easily. I do agree that it is slightly annoying they don't have a check box to not create the G+ profile but it isn't like they automatically fill it out and push everything into it. You have to manually go to G+ and finish the process if you want it, delete it if you don't.

The poster's stalker premise is also pretty silly. If I'm being stalked am I really going to be dumb enough to create accounts with my actual name on them? The whole thing still strikes me as a tempest in a teapot.

Re:Google plus

[berashith]

and just like it isnt very easy for many people to have a job without driving, it is also difficult to do many things without the internet. you should be able to limit your exposure if you would like to, without playing a constant shell game.

Re:Google plus

[Albanach]

And then I got stuck in the circle of trying to delete it from Gmail, and their asinine insults about "why do you want to delete anything when you've got so much space to keep it all?"

Are you making this up? It's easy to delete large numbers of messages in gmail.

You can used the advanced search drop-down in the address bar to find the messages you want to delete, assuming they're not already labeled in gmail.

Select the checkbox at the very top, to the left of the delete trashcan icon. Google pops up a message saying it has selected 20 messages (that number might be higher or lower depending on your settings). Now click the link "Select all conversations that match this search" and click delete.

You'll get one warning that you're about to delete everything selected. Click OK and it's all gone.

I

Re:Google plus

[Spy Handler]

he was probably talking about when Gmail was new, around 2003-2004ish. Enough people griped about not being able to delete email that Google obliged some years later.

And as far as I know, even today Google doesn't actually delete anything, it just keeps the "deleted" email out of your view.

Re:Google plus

[Arker]

"I do agree that it is slightly annoying they don't have a check box to not create the G+ profile but it isn't like they automatically fill it out and push everything into it. "

That does not appear to be correct. Since google+ came out a pic that I used for a brief time on google talk (and I made sure it was set to only ever display to people on my chat list) is now showing up on youtube.

"You have to manually go to G+ and finish the process if you want it, delete it if you don't."

And to do that you have to retroactively agree to what they did. Not reasonable, not acceptable.

I have a better idea. Google should go back and delete all the accounts that have not consented, which they should never have created in the first place, and issue a public apology.

"The poster's stalker premise is also pretty silly. If I'm being stalked am I really going to be dumb enough to create accounts with my actual name on them?"

The TOS demands your real name, which would be reasonable if they were not misusing it. Besides which, what usually happens is the stalker comes first, and only afterwards do people learn to be more careful what information they let out.

Re:Google plus

[Obfuscant]

Are you making this up? It's easy to delete large numbers of messages in gmail.

And then they move to another folder. And when you delete them from there, they move back. All Mail to Trash to All Mail to Trash to All Mail to Trash ... At least those are the two folders I remember it being.

You can used the advanced search drop-down in the address bar

I don't recall my email client having a 'drop-down in the address bar'. You do realize that not all access to Gmail is through your favorite web browser, yes?

Re:Google plus

[camperdave]

Not only is G+ not forced upon you, at all,

You don't have an Android phone, do you?

Re:Google plus

[Anonymous Coward]

*ouch*
hee hee hee
i'd actually like to chime in that i think it is bullshit that 'driving is a right, not a privilege' as a matter of principle:
*unless* you live in a major metro area or biggish town with *some* form of public transportation (and *EVEN IF YOU DO* live in said areas), diving a vehicle is just about a necessity for having most jobs, and a huge convenience that is nearly impossible to replicate with public transportation...
again, for much of our 'suburban' countryside built for the convenience of cars, not people, you are SEVERELY disadvantaged if you can't drive/don't have a vehicle...
to the extent that, yes, i believe driving should be a *right* the gummint needs good reason to abrogate, rather than a 'privilege' they can revoke upon whim...

Re:Google plus

[Albanach]

Trash is automatically emptied after thirty days. There's a prominent link to empty it now. No messages don't go back into "all mail" when you empty trash.

There's an advanced search drop down in Firefox, Chrome and Internet Explorer. It's hardly restricted to "my favorite browser". Are you suggesting Google should have made a fully featured webmail for links or w3m?

Re:Google plus

[Suffering Bastard]

Google has jumped the damned shark.

Google is jumping sharks in hell? They're evil after all!

Re:Google plus

[msobkow]

As soon as the new "feature" was announced, I went into my account and disabled it.

If I didn't *give* you my email address, I don't want you emailing me.

But I'm pretty sure I know *why* Google did this instead of letting people use G+ messaging:
No one was logging in to their G+ accounts, so they weren't seeing messages.

While technically superior to Facebook, Google+ has virtually no uptake, and all the forced use in the world won't make people like it or use it. Give it up, Google. It's a failure.

Re:Google plus

[Aighearach]

In Soviet Russia, Shark+ jumps you!

Re:Google plus

[Aighearach]

Most of the businesses I go to are just fine selling me what I want to buy from them, and letting me go elsewhere for whatever I want. Places like Radio Shack that want to try really hard to get my phone number so they can spam me or sell me other crap, those are places I used to shop.

Nobody wants Google+. We don't want it "free," we don't want it toasted, we don't want it roasted, we don't want it in a tree.
We don't want it at our doorstep at 3am with a shotgun, we don't want it on a game trail, we don't want it in our email, we don't want it on the run.

I love gmail. I used to love it for the user interface, but that... is actually really bad now. If I leave it open in a tab, something I used to do for months on end, it eats a whole core. Just gmail, eats a core by itself. To idle in a tab. When they make changes, what is the downside of letting me not change? Do they really think they benefit by forcing away the power-users who want to be able to keep using the same simple tool and be in control of it? The gmail interface sucks now, the only painless way to use gmail is with a dedicated email client. So the spam filter is the only thing that makes it better than other mail. People using other mail tell me that the other spam filters are good now, too. I still like gmail, but how much? Enough to want to be force-fed G+?

They aren't even good enough with cookies anymore to keep me logged into youtube with their silly G+ "page." I have to be very careful when I visit youtube not to click any up/down voting or anything, because it might have me "logged in" to youtube with an account that I have never ever ever typed into a youtube domain. Lame.

Oh, and opting out? Soooo 2001. If it is controversial, wait for people to opt in. If they don't, move on.

Re:Google plus

[Aighearach]

You're confused because you conflate sending private emails with "putting something on the internet." While it has always been assumed that a few sysadmins were reading your "private" emails, much as the postal inspector might open and re-seal your mail, there is a huge difference between sending a private email and "putting something on the internet."

Just like there is a difference between walking across my lawn with a package, and dumping the package out on my lawn.

Re:Google plus

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm so disgusted with Google that I've removed/frozen and replaced most of their apps on my phone (running CyanogenMod) with alternative apps. Using Box instead of Google Drive, K-9 Mail with outlook.com instead of Gmail/Email with gmail.com, Opera instead of Chrome, Bing instead of Google Search, OsmAnd Maps instead of Google Maps, OneNote instead of Google Keep, Nook instead of Google Play Books and Swype instead of Google Keyboard.

Re:Google plus

[Dishevel]

No one is reading your email. None of those people can actually even get your email address. The most they can do is click a link and get an email sent to you. (If you allow it.)

Re:Google plus

[Obfuscant]

Trash is automatically emptied after thirty days.

I didn't want to wait thirty days to get email that I had deleted two years ago out of Google's hands.

There's a prominent link to empty it now.

Not in the email client I was using to do this. Trash is just another folder to it.

No messages don't go back into "all mail" when you empty trash.

Yes, they did. Deleting messages from Trash sent them back to All Mail. Deleting them from All Mail sent them to Trash. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Are you suggesting Google should have made a fully featured webmail for links or w3m?

I know of a "lynx", but that's irrelevant. I think I am suggesting that when someone deletes an email it doesn't just move to another folder, especially when deleting from Trash. And I think I'm pointing out that the entire world doesn't use webmail when dealing with email.

Re:Google plus

[steveg]

I do.

They're *trying* to force G+ on me, but technically they haven't. Each new service they revise requires G+. They don't force you to create a profile, but features you're used to using disappear without that G+ account.

I can no longer review apps, because that requires my Google+ account. When I was using Google Talk as an IM client, my icon was defined locally (and sent to those on my buddy list via the app.) Now in the replacement for Talk (Hangouts) it is apparently tied to my non-existent G+ account and goes back and forth between being absent and using the icon I had previously designated in Talk. A great deal of the functionality of Hangouts is tied to G+.

I'm sure that there *is* a zombie G+ account in my name, but since I have never activated it or completed whatever profile they require, I'm not allowed to use those "services" that depend on it.

I do have an active Google account -- I use Gmail, Calendar, Google Music, and Android in general. But I've never used G+ and everything that explicitly depends on it are closed to me. That tells me that despite G+ supposedly being the unifying account that ties all Google services together, there is a distinction.

Re:Google plus

[amRadioHed]

What the hell client are you using? None of what you are saying is true, have you even looked at Gmail in the past decade?

Re:Google plus

[Grishnakh]

I have dropped my Gmail account and have gone to http://gmx.com/

Ok, a quick glance shows this to be another free email provider. So what's the catch? How do they pay for it?

Re:Google plus

[noh8rz10]

While it has always been assumed that a few sysadmins were reading your "private" emails, much as the postal inspector might open and re-seal your mail

Whaa??? now they know who sends me xmas cards and what my grandma is up to these days!!! what's next, responding to CC offers for me?

Re:Google plus

[Albanach]

I didn't want to wait thirty days to get email that I had deleted two years ago out of Google's hands.

So you couldn't delete mail on your old ISP's server. And you couldn't delete mail on gmail. Did you ever stop to think you might be doing something wrong?

Not in the email client I was using to do this. Trash is just another folder to it.

So what client were you using and when? If this was ten years ago, do you think anyone really cares? That's like saying you won't buy a 2013 Taurus because Ford made the Pinto.

Yes, they did. Deleting messages from Trash sent them back to All Mail. Deleting them from All Mail sent them to Trash. Wash, rinse, repeat.

This is not a problem I've ever seen in gmail. Perhaps you confused archiving with deleting?

I know of a "lynx", but that's irrelevant.

It's not irrelevant, because you won't say what client you were trying to use, and user experience of myself and others suggests gmail does not have any difficulty deleting mail.

Re:Google plus

[Mashdar]

Just because the shark is damned doesn't mean it's dead already! Extreme shark rodeo is real. I was awarded the red bandana.

Re:Google plus

[Obfuscant]

So you couldn't delete mail on your old ISP's server.

Of course I could 'delete' mail on the ISP. At least it appeared to have been deleted.

And you couldn't delete mail on gmail.

As I've already said, I could "delete" it, but it popped back and forth between two folders.

Did you ever stop to think you might be doing something wrong?

Considered it, but it isn't supposed to be rocket science. Delete and it goes away, except it didn't.

So what client were you using and when?

A stock imap/pop client on my android tablet, about 9PM.

If this was ten years ago,

No, about a year.

do you think anyone really cares?

Apparently you do, but I don't know why.

This is not a problem I've ever seen in gmail.

This is the kind of useless statement I'm used to seeing every time someone reports a problem with something. "It works for me" doesn't help solve the problem of it not working for someone else. It only means you're using a different system that doesn't have the same problem.

Perhaps you confused archiving with deleting?

Nope. There was no "archive" option, only "delete".

It's not irrelevant,

Of course it is irrelevant. You're the only one talking about "links".

and user experience of myself and others suggests gmail does not have any difficulty deleting mail.

Using the webmail interface with your favorite web browser, that's true. That's not how everyone accesses it, and it wasn't what I had available at the time so I didn't use it. And that's where I came into this discussion, that your experience (and that of the GP) isn't the same for everyone. He said that one could simply stop using Gmail, and I pointed to two examples where the choice to use Gmail was made by other people, and the latter example (student email) doesn't give them any choice at all.

Re:Google plus

[Hognoxious]

With volume, you clod. Did you sleep through the late 1990s?

Re:Google plus

[Hognoxious]

it has always been assumed that a few sysadmins were reading your "private" emails

No one is reading your email. None of those people can actually even get your email address.

So you're saying that the BOFH who set up my email address at work, college, or whatever doesn't know my email address? Did someone use one of the MIB flashing light gizmos on him?

Re:Google plus

[sycodon]

I'd really like to forward everything to a different service. Anyone have any ideas?

Re:Google plus

[gmhowell]

So what client were you using and when? If this was ten years ago, do you think anyone really cares? That's like saying you won't buy a 2013 Taurus because Ford made the Pinto.

You ever read the auto discussions on slashdot? That sort of comment is not only accepted, it is usually tagged 'Informative' or 'Insightful'.

Re:Google plus

[Albanach]

So we have the answer. Your problem is that a third party client was unable to delete the messages and empty the trash on gmail? And that apparently is all Google's fault?

Te reason I, and others, are interested is because if you had just said - "I was using XXX tablet running android version foo and couldn't find any way to batch delete email. The email client 'xyz' seems to put them in a folder called Trash and then when I try to empty that folder they go back to all mail. Unfortunately I don't have access to a desktop computer so cannot use a desktop browser" we would have looked to find you a solution.

Instead you implied you were using some official client based on your comment about google's 'asinine' remarks when you now suggest you were using a pop3/imap interface.

Re:Google plus

[YumoolaJohn]

as long as you're ok with no comments, no thumbs up/down and no spam reporting (yes, seriously), you can deattach your account from YT one (at least for the time being).

It sounds like they're forcing the issue to me.

Re:Google plus

[Bugamn]

Since google+ came out a pic that I used for a brief time on google talk (and I made sure it was set to only ever display to people on my chat list) is now showing up on youtube.

You shouldn't display your privates on the internet if you care about people finding it.

Re:Google plus

[Obfuscant]

... we would have looked to find you a solution.

I don't need you to look to find me a solution. Nowhere did I say "how can I do this?" or ask for your help with anything.

I was pointing out that abandoning Gmail isn't an option for some people, which was the claim I replied to. "If only it was that easy for all", I believe was how I put it. The students at my University cannot simply abandon Gmail because the official University email system for them IS Gmail. And unless I want to abandon my ISP and change a well-entrenched email address I can't just walk away, either. And in neither case was the user making the decision to use Gmail in the first place.

Re:Google plus

[Albanach]

So you were only posting to moan about something that we've established isn't in fact anything to do with gmail, but rather is to do with your choice of client and your refusal to access a webmail service using a modern browser?

As to the students, presumably they all either have computers or have access to a computer lab. Therefore they too have access to the official gmail interface and can delete mail at will. I also presume the university does not force them to use their student email address for non-school purposes, so they are free to chose an alternative?

While I'm sorry about your plight with an old and well-established email address, a little foresight would have been enough to make most folk realize tying their contact details to a single supplier is never a good idea. What if you move to a region they don't cover? What if they go bust or are taken over by a competitor?

Re:Google plus

[BlackHawk-666]

There's something wrong with your machine if having gmail open is even remotely noticeable on your CPU. I have 20 tabs open right now in chrome, including gmail, and the total CPU use for all 20 is still 0% of my CPU.

Open up your PC case and check inside to see if someone has replaced the gubbins with an old Commodore 64.

Re:Google plus

[BlackHawk-666]

Nope, simply that he wouldn't even bother to remember the name for a peon such as yourself and your mail is too boring to even scan by the NSA ^.^

Re:Google plus

[Aighearach]

Funny, you can't imagine google having a bug, or pushing out poorly optimized JS.

In the old days I would have been suspicious too. But since the change in leadership a couple years ago... they just aren't interested in quality. Old machines should run webmail just as well in the future as in the past, it is not actually a harder or different problem than it used to be.

Re:Google plus

[BlackHawk-666]

That's only true if you're still using the same software. Software very rarely ever gets faster. The software to display the web based media rich mail we are used to receiving now is doing a lot more work than the old text based stuff. Gmail is also doing things in the background to keep you notified of events.

I do agree though, it shouldn't be a heavy application by a long shot. Most of the hard work should already be pre-built into the browser for general work and running a mail UI shouldn't require a machine 10x more powerful than it did in 1999.

As for not imaging bugs, well, I use gmail every day and have done for over a decade now (IIRC). I've found it to be a damn fine client and not actually run into any bugs personally. It's software, so it's bound to have some, but I'd expect that one bad enough to lay the smack down so badly on your PC would perhaps be noticed by the 10s of millions of other users and fixed.

Have you tried a bunch of different browsers to see how well it works in those? I use Chrome personally, so YMMV if you use IE / Opera / Firefox / etc.

Re:Google plus

[Aighearach]

I know, right? I tell customers that every day, "works for me, must not be a real bug."

tl;dr Phonebook?

[Anonymous Coward]

Phonebooks weren't a huge problem. Will this really be a huge problem?

Do you wish to have an "unlisted number"? Don't use Gmail!

Frankly, unless they make an exception for commercial Gmail users, I see this as a good thing for other email providers and self-hosting.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[i kan reed]

Maybe it's because things were changed after they signed up for an account? Without their permission? In order to cross promote a product no one wants?

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[mythosaz]

Demand your money back.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[i kan reed]

How about I demand my personal information back? Oh wait, you can't do that, they've sold it to everyone already.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[GIL_Dude]

Spammers didn't typically scan the phone book and use automated bots to email all the people in it. So although phone books were "databases" they weren't easily accessible with some scripting.

The OP may believe that the Google+ "SPAMagedon" isn't coming - however - I have noticed that, over the last week, I have been added to the "circles" of well over one hundred "accounts". When I click on these, most of them are marketing accounts or sock puppets. Some of the names are clearly marketing: "Angry Birds Lösung 3 Stars Games.J500", "Anime TV and Title Loans Chicago", "Fred's Best Title Loans", etc. Others, when you go look at them, are pretty clearly similar. 10 people have them in circles but they have 5,000+ circled. The posts (if there are any) are just advertisements. Does anybody really think that this was random? I am pretty sure these folks are getting ready to spam using G+. Sure, they will eventually get shut down. But I'd advise people to go change the setting in GMail that allows these folks to send you mail without knowing your gmail account.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[Todd Knarr]

Yep, but them adding people to their circles does nothing for them. Circle membership is one-way: if I put you in one of my circles it gives you access to me as a member of that circle but gives me no access to you. To be useful for spamming those profiles would have to get you to add them to your circles. As for changing mail settings, I'm not sure I'd need to do it. GMail already filters spam, and this would just be a bit more spam on top of what I already get.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[SirGarlon]

It's not *your* information, it's information *about you.* See the difference?

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[mythosaz]

You've got hundreds of posts here bitching about Google. I'm going to guess you knew their privacy policies sometime before they started putting messages from people on G+ in your (low priority) inbox.

How can a guy that links his website every time he posts, and has contact button on that website, complain that he might get an unsolicited email? What sort of lunacy is that?

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[i kan reed]

That sure is the justification I'd use if I were terrible, and actively trying to squeeze as much money as possible out of spying on people.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[i kan reed]

Actually, you'll find that form doesn't work. Good luck finding the actual functioning email address on that domain too.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[i kan reed]

And no, I don't care the CMS form doesn't work, because that section of the site is only for some friends.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[LordLimecat]

Likewise, youve already used their services, and you cant give that back either.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[i kan reed]

Which is why we'd like the ability to persist the arrangement we originally agreed to, and not need to go to measures like building a doomsday device, burying it deep beneath google's headquarters and issuing anonymous ultimatums.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[mythosaz]

I've got a roughly a thousand people in circles, and I'm in a about a other people's circles -- mostly as the result of playing a game in which having friends helped early on the G+ platform when they first rolled them out [Dragon Age - for whatever that's worth] -- and now from local Ingress circles.

I've always had a smattering of obvious spam/marketing accounts add me, but I haven't seen much of a change at all, and I still haven't seen one email in my inbox from G+. Maybe it's coming, but I haven't seen it yet.

...for whatever that's worth.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[mythosaz]

Which is why we'd like the ability to persist the arrangement we originally agreed to

The original agreement allowed them to make these changes without consulting you.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[Archangel Michael]

Additionally, the meta data is abstracted away so that it is aggregated and categorized so that Google offers Contact 150,000 "slashdot user" for $4.95 (or whatever).

Unfortunately, you're uniqueness is identifiable given enough identifying points. I don't know how many people with a nom de plume themselves "Archangel" are out there, but I'm sure I'm pretty select group of people from that alone. Given that info and perhaps another three or four, you can get even more selective list and my name would be listed. I am not concerned about people identifying me, we are identifyable.

What I am concerned about is my actual email being leaked, though I am not sure who would find my email worth reading ;)

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[SirGarlon]

I'd be interested to hear the legal argument why a contract whose terms one party can rewrite at any time is enforceable, and remains enforceable after having been rewritten.

I clicked "I agree" once upon a time, when I didn't grasp the implications. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[mythosaz]

You contract with Google doesn't force any action on your part. You're free to exit the contract at any time by not using their services.

Every time they change their service, you get a new TOS, and you can agree to it or not use their service...

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[faedle]

Spammers didn't typically scan the phone book and use automated bots to email all the people in it.

No, but spammers and scammers do use automated bots to CALL all the people in the phone book.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[Aighearach]

I did. In the early 90s I was doing a "mobile home wash and wax" business with my dad, and we would copy the reverse-directory from the library, and use that to cold-call everybody in a mobile home park. Otherwise the jobs come from all over, and we were taking the bus to the jobs so we needed them lumped together.

The difference isn't in people doing it, so much as there being enough communication going on that more people know about it.

But spam is not the point, not the point of the complaints, not the point of commentary in this story.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[ArbitraryName]

I'd be interested to hear the legal argument why a contract whose terms one party can rewrite at any time is enforceable, and remains enforceable after having been rewritten.

There's no contract. A contract is an exchange of obligations. A license is unilateral permission to do something. A movie ticket is a license, you don't have a contractual right to sit through a whole movie. You can be removed from the theater at any time, for any reason. In the same vein you're being granted a license to use Google's services and you can accept it or not each time those license terms are changed.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[SirGarlon]

And if they change their TOS from "we won't disclose personally identifying information" to "we will disclose to the general public whatever we want, whenever we want," I have no power to stop them doing that with data they have already collected. They already have their data, and I can't take it back. My ceasing to use their services will not change the fact that they obtained my data by making promises that they later decided to break.

To be fair, Google has not done anything like that to my knowledge -- but Facebook has. This is not strictly hypothetical.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[DarthVain]

or just delete your useless Google+ account, problem solved.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[xaxa]

You've got hundreds of posts here bitching about Google. I'm going to guess you knew their privacy policies sometime before they started putting messages from people on G+ in your (low priority) inbox.

I think that would be the privacy policies that Google have recently been fined in France for.

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/14/01/09/2011219/google-fined-by-french-privacy-regulator

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[Kalriath]

There is an exception for Google Apps users. The box defaults to Off instead of On for us.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[mythosaz]

I suppose that depends on the initial TOS, and what, lacking verbiage to explicitly define it, a reasonable expectation of that data usage is.

*shrug*

My point was simply that the person complaining about Google has had ample opportunity to change his use of their service and doesn't. He prefers to bitch about it every time there's a Google story, while apparently still remaining a user of their services. [Or, depending on your perspective, a product of their services to be sold to Google's customer - the advertisers.]

I think you and I mostly agree on Google's TOS changes and service consolidations. Their motives are fairly transparent.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[saikou]

It's not that they want access to you. By adding you to their circle they've probably earned a click-and-view from you. Cause most people wonder "who is this person who just added me?" Click! Oh, it's an ad. With a big graphical "APRs are at new lows get your mortgage refinanced now" background and few posts that advertise cheap loans, or such.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[Hognoxious]

You contract with Google doesn't force any action on your part. You're free to exit the contract at any time by not using their services.

Can I take all the data they've collected on me?

Because if not it's like going to a hotel, and when it turns out that the room is utter shit you're free to check out. Ah, but you have to leave all your baggage, your right arm, and your left ball.

Re:tl;dr Phonebook?

[BlackHawk-666]

I have changed the terms of our arrangement. Pray I do not change them again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpE_xMRiCLE

Why Google is a bad company

[Anonymous Coward]

One of the reasons i hate Google, along with Facebook and MS and Apple and many other software developers is the forced changes. If this is so good, why not explain your reasoning and allow for an opt-in? Why must we be forced into some sort of change that we don't want or didn't ask for? It's funny because there are so many Google fans and Apple fans and what have you, but these big monolithic software developers don't care who you are or what you want; they'll force changes on you to their own benefit and F you if you don't want it. /sigh. At least hosting a domain isn't all that hard; time to use my own email.

Re:Why Google is a bad company

[Kielistic]

Because maintaining a huge amount of different versions and services that all need to work together is extremely difficult and error prone.

The problem is how often "our new changes are going to be great for you" really means "you don't want this at all". They make sure to couple every benefit with many things that you definitely do not want.

Re:Why Google is a bad company

[mlts]

That is an issue with cloud applications, and SaaS in general. You have no way of reverting back to an earlier version should a new update break things.

This is one fundamental lesson -- on the Internet, Heinlein may long since have been worm food, but TANSTAAFL is still the rule of the day. Either you pay for the E-mail account directly, or you deal with a lack of privacy.

The gmail account I have is useful for Android related stuff, but for anything professional, I use an Exchange hosted provider and a custom domain. Plus, the TOS is a lot more in my favor when I'm shelling out the cost of the account, especially the fact that only the usual people (NSA/FBI/etc.) have access to my mailbox other than just me. This is a lot more private than some providers to allow some form of access to advertisers.

Long term, I wonder about biting the bullet, tossing a couple boxes in a co-loc rack, and doing the same thing -- running my domain's E-mail on my own boxes. At least then, I know where the machines are, what type of hard disk encryption is used, what firewall (if any) is in place, and I'd know that the SSL/TLS key's signature, and if it changes, even if the CA states that it is OK, then I know something is amiss.

Re:Why Google is a bad company

[number17]

That is an issue with cloud applications, and SaaS in general.

Its a problem with any product you rent such as a car or hotel room, or service that is provided such as TV service or hair salon.

If they want to upgrade portions of their product/service then you either go with it or find somebody else that provides it.

Re:Why Google is a bad company

[Gravis Zero]

If this is so good, why not explain your reasoning and allow for an opt-in?

a) it's a free service. pay someone some money and you just might get what you want.
b) it is opt-in! don't like google+? disable it: https://plus.google.com/downgrade/

Re:Why Google is a bad company

[swillden]

If this is so good, why not explain your reasoning and allow for an opt-in?

Because then the service provider would have to support every single version of their software, forever. Before long users wouldn't have to decide whether or not to accept new features, because there wouldn't be any.

Re:Why Google is a bad company

[noh8rz10]

One of the reasons i hate Google, along with Facebook and MS and Apple and many other software developers is the forced changes. If this is so good, why not explain your reasoning and allow for an opt-in?

because it's good for google but not for the user. why would somebody opt into this plan?

Re:Why Google is a bad company

[swillden]

Eventually you see which version is more popular and phase out the less popular one.

At which point you have the same howls of outrage as now... so you've delayed the problem but not actually changed anything.

disallow searching in profile

[fast turtle]

It's the easiest solution and works across all of Google if you simply check the god damn box on the profile page to disable listing/indexing your gmail addy by Google and if you didn't do it during the initial setup or soon after Google gave us the dashboard, you deserve what you get

God damn posting filter - saying I'd posted 47 minutes ago when trying for AC - /. is going to the nuking cockroaches

Re:disallow searching in profile

[mythosaz]

Isn't it easier to just ignore a mail you might get this way, since it's unlikely to end up in a priority inbox unless you've got a relationship with that person on G+ anyway?

Re:disallow searching in profile

[misterooga]

Took me a while to get there.

1.Click on your icon (top right on my browser) to go to Account settings.
2. Click on Google + Settings
3. Under Profile (more than half way down), uncheck "Help others discover my profile in search results."
4. Cross-fingers, because who knows what other options will be added

Re:disallow searching in profile

[Obfuscant]

Took me a while to get there. 1.Click on your icon (top right on my browser) to go to Account settings. 2. Click on Google + Settings

Wait a minute. You have to use Google+ to set a Gmail account setting? I would never find that link because I deliberately do not use Google+. Yes, this is very easy to opt out of, sure.

Re:disallow searching in profile

[Arker]

"Wait a minute. You have to use Google+ to set a Gmail account setting? I would never find that link because I deliberately do not use Google+. Yes, this is very easy to opt out of, sure."

Ding ding ding. This is how screwed up google has gotten. They sign us up for a new service without our consent, then demand we log into it to opt out of stuff we never opted into. And to do that... you have to consent to the TOS.

It's a neat little trap they have constructed. Do no evil? Hah.

Re:disallow searching in profile

[Bite The Pillow]

This message is misleadingly worded because the phrase "by creating a public Google+ profile" implies that's something you can do, optionally, if you want to.

That is the source of confusion. By skipping the step, you don't choose how your info is displayed. By creating one (or going through the steps) you get to choose.

Bennett assumes a literal reading and blames it when it falls short. The intent is to say here is how to control your info.

The decision to create a shell profile is a different problem, and is only tangentially related. If Bennett would focus on the problem instead of making assumptions, literal reading, or pretending to be a noob, he might be a valuable source. But this is just embarrassing.

You are saying that you just make a change in your profile, which the instructions already say to do. If someone reads them. Like Bennett for example.

Re:disallow searching in profile

[Junta]

Considering the entire gripe was not about unsolicited mail, but that your information in some way is searchable when it previously was not, the solution of ignoring it is not applicable.

Re:disallow searching in profile

[Aighearach]

No, the G+ one is a different opt-out.

The gmail one it is a new setting added on the first tab (general), says "Who can email you via your Google+ profile?"

Re:disallow searching in profile

[misterooga]

I can't seem to find it. Perhaps my gmail is already part of G+...(and yes, I must have clicked something to allow it.. Can't recall for some reason)

Re:disallow searching in profile

[misterooga]

Where is my undo button... ignore my previous comment.

It's under the Settings (below the icon).

Thanks for the tip.

Re:disallow searching in profile

[Kalriath]

That setting doesn't exist in Google Apps accounts, just in case you have one and are confused where it is.

Really missed the point

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems that Mr. Bennett has truly missed the point. The point is that Google no longer intends to offer anybody a new "Gmail account". Henceforth they only offer a "Google+ account with email features."

In 2014 you should expect that Google will roll this change to their Google Voice product. They will stop offering a new "Google Voice account" and will only offer new "Google+ account with Hangout voice features". After that they will eventually stop offering new accounts for their other products and only offer "Google+ account with feature".

Look I don't like the change, but Apple no longer let's you create an Apple email account that isn't also an iTunes account and they have never let you create a FaceTime account that wasn't also an iTunes account.

In fact a common complaint on Apple forums for years has come from people who originally created separate Apple email and iTunes accounts and desperately want to merge them.

Re:Really missed the point

[Nerdfest]

It seems to me they're trying to move away from having gMail as the central account to Google+ being the central account. The problem is that people don't want that because Google+ is another social service (that you don't need to use, but that's what it is.) What they probably should have done is to have a simple Googler Account service that does nothing but contain your basic information and some gommon settings. Gmail, Google+, YouTube, etc are all just service that are associated with a specific Google Account. Peopl feel like they're forced to use Google+ because it's being used as the central coontact point and some want to have nothing to do with it. If you can be emailed via it, I can understand it, especially if this new capability is opt-out, which I think it is.

Re:Really missed the point

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems to me they're trying to move away from having gMail as the central account to Google+ being the central account.

It is just possible that Larry Page actually meant it when he said "Google+ is the new Google."

Re:Really missed the point

[Gravis Zero]

Google no longer intends to offer anybody a new "Gmail account". Henceforth they only offer a "Google+ account with email features."

this is a prime example of FUD. you should be modded as a troll.

Re:Really missed the point

[Branciforte]

Google+ *IS* a login service with some common settings.

The problem is that there is a social page that is also known, by the public, as Google+.

Re:Really missed the point

[phantomfive]

Because of all this, I'm thinking of switching to a different email provider, or better yet, my own mail server.

Does anyone else have experience running their own mail server (recently)? Is Spam filtering going to be a problem or something?

Re:Really missed the point

[BlackHawk-666]

I ran my own mail server for years, and then realised I'd rather have google do all the pissing about for me while I got on with something useful instead. It's not too difficult to run a mail server for yourself, and if you are hosting some other crap already it's just a little extra work.

1. Register a new domain name for yourself. For maybe $10 / year you can be certain that no-one can ever take that domain name from you (unless some big company with a similar name just does exactly that).
2. Install Postfix or another decent mail server.
3. Install some anti-spam software
4. Install some web mail front end
5. Install the POP3 / IMAP providers.

And that's pretty much it, except you now have to admin all that crap - which admittedly isn't much work, but it's more work that nothing, which is the amount of work needed to own an online mail account.

Oh yeh, almost forgot. If you ever decide to switch off that mail - make damn sure you have updated every single email address you use for logon to every damn website because you sure as fuck can't get a "reset password" mail sent to that email address once you shut down the server.

Re:Really missed the point

[phantomfive]

Thanks for the info

Re: All missing the point

[Dupple]

That's very naive. What it means is that Google collects more private data, meta data they can cross reference to target ads and still hand it over to the NSA upon request.

Sincerely,

[Anonymous Coward]

Bennett Haselton
Age 5

Google is playing a game of patience.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Google has a better revenue model than facebook. It is using that cash flow to out live competition like facebook. Facebook, despite is billion user base, is not creating any steady revenue. Google expects facebook to eventually fold and google+ will step in to fill the void because it would be the only thing with enough resources to fill the gap. It is not unlike Microsoft using its Office/Windows cash cow to outlive its competition. But unlike Microsoft, the switching costs are not very high for gmail users.

All those slashdotter bemoaning google becoming evil or waxing eloquent about privacy issues or concerned about the victims of stalkers do not form a significant enough chunk of the population to matter. If they were year 2000 would have been the year of Desktop Linux.

Re:Google is playing a game of patience.

[Aighearach]

Yes, the void is the part where those numbers change over time, sometimes for security reasons by the user, and people not in continuous contact then fall out of contact, and can't contact each other at all without going through a 3rd party; something that it is not normal to do unless you have a good reason to contact them.

I can open facebook and see what all my old friends from school are doing, who got married, whose profile picture is their kids and whose is their boat. If I really want to I can even send them a message, but in my case that is unlikely. I don't want to talk to them, I just want to know how they're doing. And since I care about some of these people, it gives me warm fuzzies to know I could easily talk to them if either of us had something to say.

And I only log in once a month. Probably 90% of my social circle from middle school is on there every day.

Re:Google is playing a game of patience.

[BlackHawk-666]

Facebook was pretty tolerable for me right until my 25th year reunion came up and all these people I vaguely knew at school started sending friend requests. Just knowing one person who is in that circle is enough to slowly get the entire lot to creep into your facebook profile via "perhaps you know this person".

My feed was filled with the vacuous, pointless drivel I had successfully avoided for the last 25 years. Sport bores the crap out of me, I don't like people's children and no I don't want you to post a photo of your "little angel" twice a week.

A lot of these people had 250-500 'friends' listed, that meant seeing a lot of friend of a friend posts in a place that was meant to help me communicate with actual friends. I was drowning in the noise and just as bad, anything I had to post was washed away by the noise of their 500 other "friends" (some had as many as 900+ friends).

Instead of improving communication between old friends and acquaintances it dumbed it down to the point of being intolerable. I trashed all the acquaintances, posted a note to the friends left, then a week later deleted them all and the account.

If someone has something to say to me they can email it directly to me. Otherwise, let it fall on the ears of the deaf crowds.

The Horror!

[Pumpkin Tuna]

My God! It's almost as if they had taken the names, phone numbers and addresses of millions of people and bound them into some sort of large book before distributing said book to everyone's home free of charge! Can you imagine the chaos such a thing might cause???

Re:The Horror!

[tgd]

My God! It's almost as if they had taken the names, phone numbers and addresses of millions of people and bound them into some sort of large book before distributing said book to everyone's home free of charge! Can you imagine the chaos such a thing might cause???

White pages tended to be limited to your town, or a small part of your town. Not, you know, 500 million people.

Re:The Horror!

[BringsApples]

Ha, beat me to it. I was going to mention the phone book too.

Re:The Horror!

[Anonymous Coward]

Now imagine that paper mailings and phone calls cost $0.000000000000001 per message. And are semi-anonymous. You're going to need a bigger mailbox.

Re:The Horror!

[Drethon]

Yeah, I ended up with a crazy stalker thanks to that...

Re:The Horror!

[mjr167]

Cause they totally didn't go and post them on the internet

Re:The Horror!

[tgd]

Cause they totally didn't go and post them on the internet

That's completely unrelated to the Telco white pages. That's a data mining site like all the other people finders, aggregating public records with equally poor accuracy.

A quick search shows 90% of the info they have on me in their "teaser" is wrong, and they claim to have my phone number, which they definitely do not. There's a hundred other sites just like that.

Re:The Horror!

[mjr167]

Give me your full name and I bet I can figure out what your home address is and that is way more dangerous than an email address. The point is that you don't need that silly book made out of dead trees to find people any more. You can choose not to list your phone number, but your name is on the deed of you house and that is public information.

Re:The Horror!

[BlackHawk-666]

Wi Wáng

I dont' know what accounts I have

[jetkust]

I started out with a Youtube account then google gave me other accounts and then it said it wanted to merge accounts it created and now I have multiple gmail, youtube, and g+ accounts and I don't know what just happened.

Not the first time they've done it

[GameboyRMH]

On the Gmail account I use on Slashdot, I had my nickname, which should be the only publicly visible name, set to "GameboyRMH." I couldn't leave the First Name and Last Name fields blank (they were separate back then) so I set them to "GameboyRMH" and "The Cool Guy."

Then one day last year my sister's giggling that I changed my username to "GameboyRMH The Cool Guy." WTF!? Turns out Google decided to expose what was in my real name fields to the public without my consent. At least my caution paid off.

Re:Not the first time they've done it

[Gravis Zero]

Turns out Google decided to expose what was in my real name fields to the public without my consent.

link? screenshot? any proof that you aren't simply trolling? i searched and found nothing.

Re:Not the first time they've done it

[GameboyRMH]

Nope sorry you'll have to take my word for it, or see if anyone else had the same problem. The change appeared on my Google Chat username only, not the name on my outgoing emails.

Re:Not the first time they've done it

[ThePhilips]

I can confirm this. My Google Talk also started showing "Nick First Last" names instead of just the Nick.

Luckily I had purged my real name from there long time ago - when I noticed that it was exposed via my blog hosted on the blogger.com . Still the junk I used showed up in other people's GTalks.

Still, it took me quite sometime to figure out what to put there: it turned out that the last name field is optional, and if you fill in the first name with the nick, then it works as before.

And no, my gmail account never ever touched anything of the Google, the Social.

Here is the page. It is whyever not accessible from my GMail, but clicking "Account Settings.." in GTalk brought it up.

Re:Not the first time they've done it

[strikethree]

Your .sig, "When information is power, privacy is freedom.", may have been posted by anonymous but was created by another Slashdot user. Jan Wryel something or other. I saw it and decided to "steal" it from him and asked him where he got it. He (she?) said he made it out of a combination of some other phrases that were going around. I can look up the exact information if you would like. Just pointing out that it was not Anonymous who created it.

Re:Not the first time they've done it

[GameboyRMH]

I got it from another Slashdot user, name started with a "B," who said he saw it on Twitter. If you can find a source I'll be sure the change the attribution. And I didn't mean that it was created by the Anonymous collective if that's what you thought :-P

Re:Not the first time they've done it

[strikethree]

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4430195&cid=45411093

Heh, no. I did not think you meant Anonymous. I was assuming an Anonymous Coward type of person. :)

Good web-based email

[Anonymous Coward]

I use gmail because it has by far the best web-based interface I've seen.

Following Snowden's revelations I'd like to switch to something else. Preferably a paid-for commercial email service, but I'd be prepared to set up a server for a good open-source solution. Either way, it needs a good web interface, and my principal requirements are:

o Works well on a small screen (so doesn't try to display the message list and a message on the same screen)

o Is responsive

o Has fast search

Does anyone have any recommendations?

Re:Good web-based email

[number17]

Just curious how those requirements (small screen, responsive, fast search) resolve the revelations (NSA spying?).

I'm not a security expert, but if your emails aren't encrypted how will you stop the NSA from reading them?

Re:Good web-based email

[aaaaaaargh!]

Do you really need web-based email? There are plenty of native pop3/imap clients for every platform that will beat a web-based system any day. And just about any paid email provider will also give you some web-based interface, too, just in case you might need it.

Security is another matter. Unencrypted email can be read by anyone from the local sysadmin to your mom, no matter where and how in the world you send it.

Re:Good web-based email

[BlackHawk-666]

Since nearly all your email will still be sent to this server in plain text, I really don't see what you think you gain from this. The NSA spies on all of the mail transactions in transit. They will know what mail you have even before you do.

alternatives?

[bzipitidoo]

For me, Google blew it when they forcefully merged my gmail and youtube accounts. I've cut back on gmail as much as I can conveniently. But I still use it.

It's hard to leave when you don't have a place to go. I used to have a nice tree of email addresses, and used them to keep email sorted between business and personal, and such like. Then most of the free email providers ended their services, and now I'm down to gmail. yahoo, and hotmail. Oh, and bigfoot still sort of works. If you call frequent delays of more than 8 hours working. (Made it difficult to reset a password on a site that sent out password reset tokens that expired in 6 hours.) Anyway, bigfoot isn't a full blown email service, it's only a redirector.

I could run my own private little email server, but have been reluctant to do so. Apart from the sysadmin work, I'd have to deal with spam somehow. And as I'm using a free Dyndns name, there's no assurance my email address would be stable. (Paying doesn't do much more to assure permanence. Dyndns could always go out of business, or be bought and merged.) I used to have a "homeip.net" name, until Dyndns changed policies and killed half their free names. Now it's "dyndns.info". Guess I can live with that. Just don't force me into godaddy.

At least there is now duckduckgo for search engines. I don't use Google's search much anymore. But what alternatives are there for email these days? Apart from yahoo and hotmail, that is?

Re:alternatives?

[Tx]

Don't be a cheapskate, pay for FastMail or other decent pay-for email provider. Sign up for a personal domain, most services throw in email accounts for free with a domain, or forward to your FastMail account. Then you are completely independent of the vagaries of the free providers, and you can keep your email addresses regardless of whatever provider or ISP you use, and it will cost very little (~$30/year depending on your choice of domain).

If you insist on free, well, you get what you pay for.

Re:alternatives?

[chihowa]

There are free(mium) alternatives to DynDNS, like freedns, so you can change providers if one tanks. If you use your own domain (like freedns allows you to do), you can switch between them without much trouble (you'll just change your NS with the registrar).

Run your own mailserver and pay for backup MX service. This helps ease any worries you may have about losing email (due to your server/ISP downtime, etc). The backup MX is only used if your mail server can't be contacted and will hold mail while you fix the situation. (From a privacy perspective, your email will only be vulnerable to third part disclosure during the times that you're experiencing some sort of catastrophe.)

The sysadmin work is certainly something to deal with, but if you stick with a barebones install and a stable (but actively supported) mail server, you can keep your involvement to a minimum. I find SpamAssassin to to a great job of filtering spam.

There's some work involved in setting everything up, but maintaining it all is pretty painless.

Re:alternatives?

[Wolfrider]

--Try inbox.com, I've been with them for about a year and haven't really had problems with them. Has a Web interface like yahoo/gmail, and haven't personally had issues with spam there.

Abolish privacy?

[h00manist]

Sure, abolish privacy for everyone who holds a government position. They are working for the public anyway - aren't they.

Re:Abolish privacy?

[LordLimecat]

Not sure if you're serious.

Citizens are citizens and should all receive the same class of constitutional protections. Pretty sure thats what the fourteenth amendment is about, actually.

$6/month to not be listed.

[oneiros27]

It's been so long ago since I had a land-line account, I can't remember if I was paying $8/month for service plus $6/month to not be listed, or the other way around.

Either way, it was possible for pay the phone company so that I did *not* show up in the phone book. Which I happily paid, as I'm one of those people with a unique name, and previously had a stalker.

If you want quality, pay for it

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Then most of the free email providers ended their services, and now I'm down to gmail. yahoo, and hotmail.

I pay a few GBP a year for a hosted Linux shell account from a local IT firm. I can run whatever web sites I want from it, have it collect and/or forward e-mails and run any related systems I want, etc. It's not free, and neither are the handful of domains I own.

Because I own the domains, I'm paying for the hosting, and everything is set up with real, standardised tools, I can shift anything around any time I want. I can't be held hostage by any business having my data locked up in their proprietary system, or by any one technology that doesn't export things to someone else's alternative platform. This mostly doesn't matter, because I also get actual customer service from the IT guys in return for paying them actual money.

Personally, I download the mail to my main PC, where I run an actual e-mail program instead of relying on webmail. However, I could set up a local mail store on my home network or install any web front end I wanted on the hosted account if some other set-up became more useful.

None of this is rocket science, and there are plenty of hosting companies that will offer a similar basic plan for a modest fee (a small fraction of what I pay every year in, say, phone bills). I also pay a bit more than average to use a good ISP with solid technical specs, clueful people at the other end of the phone on the rare occasions anything does go wrong, things like a static IP address as standard, etc.

Basically, you just have to look beyond free-as-in-you're-the-product on-line services, absurdly cheap junk hosting, and mass market ISPs, and much of the frustration of the modern Internet goes away. It's just a shame that most people don't realise that, so the big name companies continue to dominate and there is a limited market for smaller-but-better services.

Re:If you want quality, pay for it

[Grishnakh]

I also pay a bit more than average to use a good ISP with solid technical specs, clueful people at the other end of the phone on the rare occasions anything does go wrong, things like a static IP address as standard, etc.

Here in America, such a thing is not available at any price. Unless you're willing to settle for dog-slow DSL speeds (forget about any kind of streaming video), you have either 1 or 2 choices for ISPs: your local cable company (like ComCast), or your local telecom company (like Verizon). In many places, there's only 1 choice.

I guess if you don't mind spending an extra $100/month on top of what you're paying for your mass-market ISP, you can opt for one of the DSL ISPs as they do seem to tout reliability as their selling point, and use that for email and other such stuff while using the mass-market ISP for Netflix and Youtube, but that's not a cheap prospect at all (probably between $150-200/month total).

Re:If you want quality, pay for it

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Wow. I'd heard assorted horror stories about poor ISPs and people not having a choice in the US, but I always assumed they were at least slightly exaggerated. There is really no effective competition for Internet connectivity in the US in 2014?

I could sign up with dozens of different ISPs here in England. It's true that much of that flexibility came from some surprisingly sensible rules a few years ago that required BT (the dominant phone company) to share access to certain facilities. But even without relying on BT or a cable company, there are various mobile providers with 3G and soon 4G connections, there are rural areas where people literally use satellites to get their access because they are too far from a telephone exchange to use the same facilities most urban households do, and there have been a few unique stories where locals have clubbed together and set up something unusual (but sometimes achieving better speeds and/or lower costs to regular providers).

This was just meant as a side anecdote that fitted neatly in with the general strategy I have for paying a little more than the entry-level of everything to get much better results, and doesn't really affect my basic point about how to manage facilities like e-mail without becoming dependent on Google and the like. But I'm surprised and sorry to hear that not everyone can do things we take for granted over hear.

Re:If you want quality, pay for it

[Grishnakh]

Ok, maybe I left some options out.

But even without relying on BT or a cable company, there are various mobile providers with 3G and soon 4G connections

Yes, we have that too. But cellular data access is expensive (usually $30/month for any smartphone, plus regular cellular access charges), and carries small monthly caps (2G/month, perhaps). It's entirely useless as a main connection. There's unlimited ones available, but now you're looking at prices much higher than the cable/fiber-telecom alternatives.

there are rural areas where people literally use satellites to get their access because they are too far from a telephone exchange to use the same facilities most urban households do,

Yes, we have Hughes satellite too. It's expensive (always more than the land-based alternatives) and has terrible latency.

I left out these "alternatives" because they're always even more expensive than the other ones, and you're not going to get service that's any better, in fact it could be worse (cellular companies here aren't exactly known for good service).

Re:If you want quality, pay for it

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Those are fair points, but there are also paid-for e-mail services that offer similar facilities to Google and friends without downsides like ads.

Also, setting up basic hosting facilities and getting your own domain aren't really any more complicated than many other technical tasks non-geeks perform all the time. For example, plenty of these hosting services would let you do all of that from a user-friendly web-based control panel, without going anywhere near a command line. I think the problem here is as much the lack of general education about how the Internet works as anything else.

Welcome to SaaS

[Junta]

This is the nature of the software as a service beast.

With traditional software (Windows OS is a good example), you have three choices, embrace the change, discontinue use of the product, or keep using old product and ignore change.

The 'ignore change' evaporates in software as a service model.

Stop using parenthetical asides

[vegitron]

In previous stories you've asked for specific writing tips. Here you are: stop using parenthetical asides. This doesn't contribute to your point: (although I don't know what that limit is).

If you want to make this point: conventional email spam grew to unmanageable proportion, you should move that before the conclusion of your paragraph. You should also tighten that sentence up to something like: Conventional email spam grew to unmanageable proportions because anybody with an email server could send out millions of messages per day.

That one change will make your paragraphs more focused, and easier to read. I hope that helps!

What a douche

[EmperorOfCanada]

How the hell did this make it onto Slashdot. I have asked this question before but this is one of the most narcissistic blowhards to make onto slashdot in a long while.

Just the way he writes is so condescending so as to make me want to do the opposite of what he says. If he recommends 21% oxygen then I might give serious thought as to switching to argon.

I think that 90% of us can agree. G+ is a pile of dung being foisted upon us by some MBAs working at google. As for the spam thing. I just got 2 spam chat requests. I have never received a spam chat request before. Google quite simply is missing the point. Most people want to remain in contact with a small group of select friends. But a few narcissistic blow hards like this tool are so insecure that they think that the whole world is beating a path to their podium and thus they want things like FB and G+ to enable this mentally unstable behavior.

There is a reason why the term is Facebook Friend Whore and not Facebook-amazing-paragon-of-social-amazingness. The problem is that the social networks (Youtube included) are being deceived into thinking that these few unstable folks represent the rest of us; and thus are creating more and more features to enable their behavior. MySpace went straight for the heart of their own network when they primarily tailored their system to enable the worst behavior of rappers, highschool girls and whatnot; the result was that they drove away the regular users.

A simple example of only giving feedback to these self absorbed tampons of human beings is that facebook does not have a dislike button. This way a person might post the 800th picture of their dog being cute and find that the 20 likes are balanced by 120 dislikes. "Yeah you halfwitted oxygen sponge, we all hate your stupid dog now."

BTW I don't even know if Bennett Haselton has a dog; but I hate it now.

Founder of Circumventor.com and Peacefire.org?

[psithurism]

Seriously, Anonymous Coward wants to know if this account has enough klout to deserve an opinion? If you think that people's insights are only worthwhile because of their notoriety, your using the wrong account.

Maybe some of us care what he says because he has some good points?

So What?

[jklovanc]

you've already done the damage (the stalker now knows your email address, plus the fact that it's still an actively used account).

So stalkers know the email addresses. What can they do with that information? If they harass the victim they get blocked.

This sounds a little like the "what about the children" arguments.

Re:So What?

[jklovanc]

For example, your picture is on your YouTube account.

As far as I can tell YouTube users are not searchable by email address. Postings are displayed the YouTube user name and not email address. How can someone see a user photo by email address? Most sites do not have a search by email address because they want to keep that information private.

Re:So What?

[bennetthaselton]

You could always continue to harass the recipient by sending messages from different email addresses. You can only block a sender if the sender is really lazy.

Upside to this

[Todd Knarr]

It allows people to essentially e-mail you without having to know your e-mail address and without being able to send e-mail to you via SMTP.

Think about this for a minute. Spammers and fraudsters like it when they can use botnet-based bulk-mailing tools, because they can send mail quickly and there's no central place that can filter them without catching a lot of false positives. And the filtering fails because it's being done on the receiving end where it has to deal with a lot of unique senders. If I can only be reached through my G+ profile, that doesn't work. The spammer doesn't know my e-mail address, and G+ doesn't accept SMTP. He has to use Google's Web interface, which is harder to do through a botnet-based bulk-mailing system. And his mail will be intercepted and filtered at the sender, not the recipient. Google can identify a unique sender and spam-file them without affecting other senders. Google has an incentive to do this, too. Yes as an account holder I'm their product, but Google's always grasped one thing to a degree other sites haven't: I'm a product with legs. If they annoy me too much, I can get up and walk away. So Google's always tried to moderate how much their service functionality (as opposed to the UI, that's another matter) annoys people. Spammers and fraudsters don't provide any revenue to Google and they annoy Google's product, so Google's got good reasons to filter and spam-file anyone trying to abuse this system and the system makes it easy to do that without nearly as many false positives (which would also annoy their product) to worry about.

Overall I'd only be bothered by this if I were trying to maintain an e-mail address and online identity with no public presence at all. For that I wouldn't depend on any third-party service at all, I'd set up a server on Linode or AWS running my own e-mail software. Linode is $20/month for a minimum-sized server that'll easily handle the load and it took me an afternoon to completely set up e-mail for IMAP and inbound and outbound (authenticated SSL sessions only) SMTP for my domain including spam filtering.

Fishy remarks

[fyngyrz]

Is Gshark in beta?

You're confused. Betas are small tropicals. Gsharks would eat betas. Not the other way around.

No need to thank me, I'm here to help.

I have just went through a google account

[anatoli]

creation process. It doesn't mention "public profile" anywhere. It doesn't join me G+ in a sneaky way like described in the article It does prompt me to "upgrade" though, but I don't have to actively avoid it, like some comments imply.

My name there is "- -" (dash as the first name, dash as the second name), can you find me on G+?

TEntireFA doesn't make much sense.

I've given up on G+

[sg_oneill]

I ended up deleting my google+ account over the stupid youtube integration. I'm sick of being bait and switched by that company. I don't WANT people on Google+ to go finding my gmail page, its for work. The invasions of privacy are getting too much to bear. I can't use my own name on Facebook anymore due to the horrible graph search and abuse of it by recruiters, and now google is trying to burn down whatever privacy I have left.

Social sites want to know everything we do

[pebear]

I like to limit what social sites get in terms of monitoring my web activity and reporting it to all my Family and Friends all over the world, especially when I"m surfing porn.....