Google: “You can use your Google account to sign in and easily invite friends to Latitude from your existing list of contacts or by entering their email addresses. Google Talk is integrated with Latitude… Latitude gives you control over how much or little location information you want to share, and with whom. And of course Latitude is 100% opt-in.”
RWW: “For millions of users, Google already knows how they search, what they click, what they buy, who they know, how they communicate, and where they go on the Web. Location enables them to add another critical data point – where they are when they’re performing any of those actions. So if you think Google has too much information about you already, you’ve got another think coming.”
RWW: “Did Google just kill all the other mobile social networks? – The ability to connect to all our real-life, real-world friends and family – friends that include mainstream web users, mom, dad, and the kids – is something that just isn’t here yet. No matter which mobile social network you end up using, including Google’s, you’re only going to see a slice of your actual social network. A true mobile social network would integrate friends from all the major social networks we participate in, plus our bevy of work colleagues from the social network hidden in our email, and, for all those non-participants out there, it would let us add them via their mobile phone number. But that really would be creepy, so we sort of hope it never happens.”
TC: “In a sense, Latitude is a private version of Yahoo’s Fire Eagle geo-location service. There is no way to broadcast your location to the public at large, only to your own Gmail contacts. (It does not yet work with Google Friend Connect). Obviously, there would be privacy concerns with publicly sharing your location at all times, but it is already happening and public geo-broadcasting will only become more popular over time.”
BW: “Of course, the obvious question is: Isn’t this just a fine stalker tool? Not surprisingly, Google thought about this a lot, and offers a wide variety of ways to make sure you can’t be tracked if you don’t want to (and a readymade quote from Cindy Southworth, firector of the Safety Net Project at the National Network to End Domestic Violence, saying she worked with Google on the privacy aspects). The service is opt-in, and you can control precisely who among your friends and relatives can see your location. You can hide your location from everyone or particular people, opt to share only the city you’re in generally, or just turn the service off.”
CW: “Dan Olds, principal analyst at Gabriel Consulting Group, said the Google tool is interesting even if there are obvious potential privacy issues when people know your every move. – ‘Latitude puts a powerful tool in users’ hands. Parents can easily track their children. People can follow their friends’ travels,’ said Olds. ‘Businesses can watch employee movements across the world or inside a particular facility. It will allow them to quickly dispatch, for example, the closest service person to a customer location. With Latitude, it can be done without taking the time to call service people to find out if the workers actually are where they think they are. The company will automatically know.'”
Forrest: “I do not think of Google as a social company. Though many of their products have a social component doing something with other people, being social is not usually the main focus of a product (GChat and GMail are noticeable exceptions). Instead I read feeds by myself and share selected posts. I make a map for myself and share it. I organize my photos and share some via my own web album. Latitude fits into this model: I get my location for myself (for directions or nearby search) and as an afterthought I share it with a select group of people, however because location-sharing is such a social activity I think it will begin to become a major focus of their Maps app (I wonder if I will be able to get access to my friend’s locations via an API or better yet share my Latitude derived location via Fire Eagle).”
PCW: “Here are three reasons why I won’t be hopping on the bandwagon. 1. It’s just a little too friendly. 2. Google already has enough dirt on me. 3. Who knows who could end up getting the data?”
Telegraph: “One possibility is that Google could make Latitude a premium fee-based subscription product. That seems unlikely, though, given the company’s focus on building market share with free products like its online software. – A likelier possibility is that Google will use Latitude to bring in traffic and then monetize it with targeted advertising. That has potential. If Google knew a group of friends were in the vicinity of certain restaurants and bars, it could suggest them as destinations. And once users had friends on Latitude, it would be difficult to get rid of the product, making the service sticky.”
FAZ: “Der nackte Wahnsinn – Will man das? Vermutlich werden es viele wollen.”
SZ: “Handy-Ortung ist höchst umstritten, doch das ist Google egal. … Bei Google weiß man laut Pressesprecher Stefan Keuchel um die Befürchtungen vieler Verbraucher hinsichtlich des Datenschutzes: “Deshalb haben wir auch mehrere Sicherungen eingebaut, die garantieren, dass der Nutzer die totale Kontrolle hat.” Demnach kann der Anwender seine Position jederzeit vor einzelnen oder allen Nutzern verbergen.”
SO: “Im Grunde hat Google damit das Versprechen von den sogenannten Location Based Services, den ortsbezogenen Diensten, ein gutes Stück weit eingelöst. Bleibt nur die Frage, ob man das eigentlich will. – Wer sich ohnehin im Internet nach dem Motto ‘ich habe doch nichts zu verbergen’ digital entblößt, wird Latitude lieben. Eine testweise an gut ein Dutzend Google-Nutzer verschickte Bitte um Freigabe ihrer Positionsdaten blieb aber vollkommen erfolglos. Exemplarisch dürfte die Antwort eines der Angeschrieben sein: ‘Geht dich gar nix an.’ – Da hat Google noch einige Überzeugungsarbeit zu leisten.”
iPhoneBlog: “Mit Google Latitude greift der Suchmaschinenanbieter in einem einzigen Atemzug all die ‘ich-bin-hier-und-mache-jenes’-Dienste an. Über das Google Maps-Kartenmaterial verteilt, kann man so verfolgen wo sich seine Freunde gerade aufhalten und was sie tun.”
FTD: “Lokalisierte Dienste gelten als ein wichtiges zukünftiges Geschäftsmodell für die Mobilfunk- und Internet-Branche. Es geht dabei zum Beispiel um Werbung für Angebote in der Nähe des aktuellen Standorts eines Handy-Nutzers. Google könnte die Verbreitung solcher Dienste hohe zusätzliche Werbeerlöse bringen.“
[…] (180), Google Latitude (3), Google Talk, Net (690), Web (1,000) Google released 2 apps for Latitude that automatically update Google Talk, Gmail chat, any website; http://tr.im/kt3f […]
Gerrit Eicker 09:56 on 5. February 2009 Permalink |
Google: “You can use your Google account to sign in and easily invite friends to Latitude from your existing list of contacts or by entering their email addresses. Google Talk is integrated with Latitude… Latitude gives you control over how much or little location information you want to share, and with whom. And of course Latitude is 100% opt-in.”
RWW: “For millions of users, Google already knows how they search, what they click, what they buy, who they know, how they communicate, and where they go on the Web. Location enables them to add another critical data point – where they are when they’re performing any of those actions. So if you think Google has too much information about you already, you’ve got another think coming.”
RWW: “Did Google just kill all the other mobile social networks? – The ability to connect to all our real-life, real-world friends and family – friends that include mainstream web users, mom, dad, and the kids – is something that just isn’t here yet. No matter which mobile social network you end up using, including Google’s, you’re only going to see a slice of your actual social network. A true mobile social network would integrate friends from all the major social networks we participate in, plus our bevy of work colleagues from the social network hidden in our email, and, for all those non-participants out there, it would let us add them via their mobile phone number. But that really would be creepy, so we sort of hope it never happens.”
TC: “In a sense, Latitude is a private version of Yahoo’s Fire Eagle geo-location service. There is no way to broadcast your location to the public at large, only to your own Gmail contacts. (It does not yet work with Google Friend Connect). Obviously, there would be privacy concerns with publicly sharing your location at all times, but it is already happening and public geo-broadcasting will only become more popular over time.”
BW: “Of course, the obvious question is: Isn’t this just a fine stalker tool? Not surprisingly, Google thought about this a lot, and offers a wide variety of ways to make sure you can’t be tracked if you don’t want to (and a readymade quote from Cindy Southworth, firector of the Safety Net Project at the National Network to End Domestic Violence, saying she worked with Google on the privacy aspects). The service is opt-in, and you can control precisely who among your friends and relatives can see your location. You can hide your location from everyone or particular people, opt to share only the city you’re in generally, or just turn the service off.”
CW: “Dan Olds, principal analyst at Gabriel Consulting Group, said the Google tool is interesting even if there are obvious potential privacy issues when people know your every move. – ‘Latitude puts a powerful tool in users’ hands. Parents can easily track their children. People can follow their friends’ travels,’ said Olds. ‘Businesses can watch employee movements across the world or inside a particular facility. It will allow them to quickly dispatch, for example, the closest service person to a customer location. With Latitude, it can be done without taking the time to call service people to find out if the workers actually are where they think they are. The company will automatically know.'”
Forrest: “I do not think of Google as a social company. Though many of their products have a social component doing something with other people, being social is not usually the main focus of a product (GChat and GMail are noticeable exceptions). Instead I read feeds by myself and share selected posts. I make a map for myself and share it. I organize my photos and share some via my own web album. Latitude fits into this model: I get my location for myself (for directions or nearby search) and as an afterthought I share it with a select group of people, however because location-sharing is such a social activity I think it will begin to become a major focus of their Maps app (I wonder if I will be able to get access to my friend’s locations via an API or better yet share my Latitude derived location via Fire Eagle).”
PCW: “Here are three reasons why I won’t be hopping on the bandwagon. 1. It’s just a little too friendly. 2. Google already has enough dirt on me. 3. Who knows who could end up getting the data?”
Telegraph: “One possibility is that Google could make Latitude a premium fee-based subscription product. That seems unlikely, though, given the company’s focus on building market share with free products like its online software. – A likelier possibility is that Google will use Latitude to bring in traffic and then monetize it with targeted advertising. That has potential. If Google knew a group of friends were in the vicinity of certain restaurants and bars, it could suggest them as destinations. And once users had friends on Latitude, it would be difficult to get rid of the product, making the service sticky.”
Gerrit Eicker 10:53 on 5. February 2009 Permalink |
FAZ: “Der nackte Wahnsinn – Will man das? Vermutlich werden es viele wollen.”
SZ: “Handy-Ortung ist höchst umstritten, doch das ist Google egal. … Bei Google weiß man laut Pressesprecher Stefan Keuchel um die Befürchtungen vieler Verbraucher hinsichtlich des Datenschutzes: “Deshalb haben wir auch mehrere Sicherungen eingebaut, die garantieren, dass der Nutzer die totale Kontrolle hat.” Demnach kann der Anwender seine Position jederzeit vor einzelnen oder allen Nutzern verbergen.”
SO: “Im Grunde hat Google damit das Versprechen von den sogenannten Location Based Services, den ortsbezogenen Diensten, ein gutes Stück weit eingelöst. Bleibt nur die Frage, ob man das eigentlich will. – Wer sich ohnehin im Internet nach dem Motto ‘ich habe doch nichts zu verbergen’ digital entblößt, wird Latitude lieben. Eine testweise an gut ein Dutzend Google-Nutzer verschickte Bitte um Freigabe ihrer Positionsdaten blieb aber vollkommen erfolglos. Exemplarisch dürfte die Antwort eines der Angeschrieben sein: ‘Geht dich gar nix an.’ – Da hat Google noch einige Überzeugungsarbeit zu leisten.”
iPhoneBlog: “Mit Google Latitude greift der Suchmaschinenanbieter in einem einzigen Atemzug all die ‘ich-bin-hier-und-mache-jenes’-Dienste an. Über das Google Maps-Kartenmaterial verteilt, kann man so verfolgen wo sich seine Freunde gerade aufhalten und was sie tun.”
FTD: “Lokalisierte Dienste gelten als ein wichtiges zukünftiges Geschäftsmodell für die Mobilfunk- und Internet-Branche. Es geht dabei zum Beispiel um Werbung für Angebote in der Nähe des aktuellen Standorts eines Handy-Nutzers. Google könnte die Verbreitung solcher Dienste hohe zusätzliche Werbeerlöse bringen.“
Privacy International: Security Flaw in Google Latitude « Wir sprechen Online. 08:33 on 6. February 2009 Permalink |
[…] Privacy International, Web Privacy International says it identified a major security flaw in Google Latitude; http://tr.im/ewac […]
Google Latitude Apps « Wir sprechen Online. 23:16 on 4. May 2009 Permalink |
[…] (180), Google Latitude (3), Google Talk, Net (690), Web (1,000) Google released 2 apps for Latitude that automatically update Google Talk, Gmail chat, any website; http://tr.im/kt3f […]
Check-ins: Individual vs. Automatic « Wir sprechen Online. 14:13 on 15. March 2010 Permalink |
[…] Individual vs. Automatic Individually caused check-ins seem to be preferred over automatic location tracking; http://j.mp/dgknH3 […]