Look whos watching too!

Okay, I am now officially paranoid and want to go off the radar. Literally. And you thought the Patriot Act was a travesty of privacy? Think again!

Google Latitude lets you track friends, employees.

Swiss Police Find Marijuana Field with Google Earth

I know it's Friday, but I thought I'd share this story with you since we talked about google last time.

here's the link: Swiss Police Find Marijuana Field with Google Earth

Google, so called 'evil' by technology critics, has uncovered evil this time. To me, this news was hilarious after what we've read for the last week. Maybe we should take more advantage of Google rather than accusing it of spoiling us.

The Google mind

I like how in the "Is Google Making Us Stupid" article, he starts out saying his attention span does not last as long as he used to, them he writes a multi-page article.

I feel our reason for reading has changed, and therefore where we go to find our information has changed. With the growing popularity of the internet, people have began to rely on it for reference or "how to" information. This not only puts stress on professionals because amateurs can learn how to do their craft in a matter of seconds, but it also reduces the amount of reading for pleasure. With the appeal of endless information, it is apparently harder to focus on something that is just for pleasure.

Personally I do enjoy reading for pleasure, but my attention span does not carry over to what I'm reading for other reasons, probably because I know I could get a synopses somewhere else and not really be worried about losing the story value like in a novel.

http://www.googleityoumoron.com

Okay, I admit it. Google is now my answer to everything. Don’t judge me, I know it’s the same for you too.

Excellent! Maybe. Or maybe our ability to retain and process information has pretty much come to an end. I was an avid quizzer till my undergraduate days. I was ranked among the top three in my state and used to be an encyclopedia of ‘unwanted’ information. The problem is, during grad school in India and while working, I started getting hooked to search engines. They sure did make fact checking easy! Considering I can’t check facts or learn new things without going to my online Mecca, I can safely say that the part of my brain that remembers things has started to rot. I can now barely remember my appointments for the day without my Google Calendar or the name of George Bush’s dog, let alone its breed! This from a person who remembers the name of the referee during the Hand of God goal – and I don’t even like soccer!

But then again, we live in an information society and we know and have access to a lot more information at our fingertips than ever before. So how are we supposed to remember anything, let alone trivia, when we can access Google from pretty much anything that has the capacity to go online? Why use a typewriter when you have a computer? Why remember possibly inane things when you have Google?

Carr observes that with the Internet, we are progressively used to skim through and jump from link to link, a habit he suspects that may have a negative effect on our brain, alienating us from serious and focused reading. In his book Digitopia, Richard Degrandpre, talks about a generation that is allowing the digital media to completely take over their lives. So much so that it is hard for them to do anything for a long period. I personally take offence to the generalization that we are a generation who won’t be content to sit through a three-hour epic or read an 800-page book. People do what they want with technology. In the same way as you choose what to write in an MSWord document, you can choose what you look for on Google. Also, with a dishwasher at home, why would you do dishes the traditional way?

Maybe I’m paranoid, or I’m just plain cynical, but there will be day when we’re going to sit at a bar and have a conversation about: Remember books? Those were the things we read before e-mail, Web browsing, and Facebook.

Humans are good at adapting, and with luck, this question too shall pass: Is Google making us stupid?