> It serves Google and the common good.

There. Fixed it for you. You can’t deny the benefits it brings to the average person having all this information a (google) search away.

If phrased that way, we should probably celebrate it - it's increasingly uncommon for business interests to be even tangentially aligned with society's interests, even in small areas of the product/service.

I can deny that Google doing something that happens to serve its specific interests, and that Google may without gainsay or penalty discontinue doing at any instant it should so please, qualifies as a common good. I can deny that all day!

Okay I’ll bite. It serves the common good today, but if you intend to say it may turn out to make us live our lives based on something that can disappear any day and that would cause more harm than the benefits up to that point, then yes, this sentence is too long.

But I get all those same benefits simply from other people not carrying about their own privacy and security. I still keep location services, Bluetooth, WiFi, etc. off except when I'm using them in the moment and create a separate Google ID for each phone. My individual habits get lost in the noise.

First I was like "no, it does serve the common good". But on second thought: replay to 30 years ago, and there weren't really problems. Word-of-mouth combined with places closing because they were just too bad too survive worked fine. So maybe the common good doesn't need serving the Google way.. Possible real benefit is you can get super-detailed reviews from many different people. But I'm not sure there really is a need or market for that (well, except Google).

these days, i wonder if the dynamics of 'word of mouth' is still operationally the same. the internet is isolating and alienating in it's own way, so i'm uncertain how well the 'old ways' (circa all of ~20 years ago) still function.

If I'm visiting somewhere, I usually ask for recommendations from someone I trust (family, or whoever I'm staying with). Yelp reviews and such are good if I don't have any other source of information about the place, though.