Welcome to the machine

And in more slightly creepy news, Google officially launched their Web History tool earlier this week. And whilst there is a certain cool factor in being able to see your web history no matter which computer you are on, I don't know if I'm really entirely comfortable with it. Particularly when I can access my search history all the way back to 2005. I don't recall signing up for that. (maybe I did? I'm not entirely sure how it works, and I am a terminal early adopter of things - so many accounts which I've signed up for and forgotten - that maybe I did say they could store all my search history without me knowing). And it certainly isn't everything, cause I've definitely done more than the 600 or so searches it says I have in the last two years.

However, in light of the Google move on DoubleClick, and the subsequent complaint from US privacy groups, it might not be so unreasonable to worry about why Google might want to be tracking our search data. Thankfully, it's easy to turn off, if you don't want Google knowing too much about your buying habits, or you late night furtive searches, but it is something to bear in mind...