The most profound piece of technology I discovered in 2013 was Google Now. It is a service on my Android phone which keeps track of me. Literally! I pops up my appointment, tells me before I leave how traffic is on my normal route to kids school and work. It also pops up news stories that is presumed relevant to me based on my search patterns and use of services like YouTube, Google Music and Video. On top of that it knows how far I have walked, biked and run giving me stats at the end of the month nicely packaged with graphs and bars. Incredible! Google Now starts out as something not very useful and learns as you go getting more and more to the point and accurate the longer it is being used. It is also voice controlled to an extent I have never experienced. It really understands what I am saying and gives me the results I want. I can say “I want to go home” and it directs me home commenting on unusual traffic and gives me the weather and important news as I go.
But then there’s the dark side to all of this. I am not giving Google any more information about myself than I otherwise would. Google knows all these things already. What happens here is that it is all put together painting a picture of who I am, what I do, when I do it and often why. And if an service like Google Now can be so accurate with regards to what I am doing and where I am doing it all the time, someone else could access it and have me pictured spot on. Advertisers must love this technology and I’m pretty sure NSA is drooling over it also unless they are already using it. Sad thing is that I have somewhat given up on protecting my privacy as far as Google goes. It’s just too convenient and addictive having your life gathered and organized like Google now is able to. We need an alternative though, but who could do it? I do not have the answer to that but hope that something will come along in 2014 which can indicate other ways to go, give us other options. Right now the only other option is pulling the plug on Google and pretend you do not need them. I can do that, but right now I do not even want to comforting myself with the fact that no one would be interested in my boring where- and whatabouts anyway.
Happy New Year!
