I'm sympathetic to these worries, but to play devil's advocate I wonder which kind of privacy most people actually care more about. Given the choice between having one's boss/co-workers/family/spouse learn some embarrassing secret about you, and having random strangers at a large corporation learn it, which would most people pick?

Even Google employees generally don't have access to your data stored at Google, so it's really boss/co-workers/family/spouse vs. a computer.

This applies now, but that data isn't going anywhere. There's nothing to stop that policy from changing in the future.

Other than FTC and DOJ oversight, you mean.

There's no question that people care more about what their immediate acquaintances know about them. That doesn't mean it's a great path for society, though.

Unfortunately the fashionable thing to do these days is to assume that everything will work out for the best on its own.

I completely agree. But I think if you want things to change it helps to understand why people make the decisions they do (and that they're "locally" rational most of the time).

Are suggesting that the personal information you upload to Facebook isn't available to random strangers at that particular corporation?

At least Google has aspirations of not being evil. Mark Zuckerberg only seems to aspire to eliminating privacy altogether.

My post was hypothetical; I'd imagine Google does have rules and procedures in place to keep your data private vis-a-vis random voyeurism by employees (but how would I know?)

I do find it amusing that the control of the web and computing by a handful of companies is now apparently ingrained in some people's heads as axiomatic, such that any apparent criticism of one oligarch is automatically a defense of the other.

I'm not defending Google, I'm just pointing out that, unlike Facebook, their founders haven't declared the "Age of Privacy" as over.

FWIW: I dislike Facebook but I use it anyway because that's where everyone I know seems to be. If I could substitute it for another service that lets me more tightly control who sees what, then great.

I prefer a random stranger to know that I was out drinking last night vs my boss. One has more immediate implications to my income the other, much less likely.

When that random stranger is Eric Schmidt & co...?

Which will directly affect me more, my wife learning about my adulterous affair, or Eric Schmidt learning about my affair?

Which will directly affect humanity more?