Buzz Kill

[aelfgyfu_mead]

In case you haven't heard, the new Google Buzz tends to reveal rather more than many people realized it would reveal (cleolinda has a few details here). If you've already turned it on, turning it off is insufficient. Thanks to rydra_wong for the links to the previously-mentioned entry and what seems to be the best info now: Buzz off: Disabling Google Buzz.

I want to spread the word because I fear this could be a serious problem for some people.

I'm also pretty shocked. Call me naïve (I'm sure someone will), but even though I'm a bit suspicious of Google and its power, I really like my Gmail, and it never crossed my mind that Buzz would be bad. I hadn't turned it on because I simply hadn't got round to reading what it was and did, but I'm not sure that reading the description would have alerted me to potential problems: like the fact that my Gmail address is my fic name, but I use it to e-mail some other fans whose real identities I know using their real names, thereby potentially compromising their separation of real life person and online persona.

ETA: DISREGARD AS WRONG: Apparently, if you never used it at all, you can simply just click the "turn Buzz off" at the bottom of your Gmail safely. (If anyone knows otherwise, please alert me!)

Comments

[aelfgyfu_mead]

I turned it back on just long enough to determine that I had no followers (and of course am following no one).

(so if I activated buzz and I had you as an email contact, you'd show up on my list even if you hadn't)
But now that I have actively turned OFF Buzz, you can't follow me, can you? Because I can't find a way to preempt would-be followers if having Buzz off doesn't do it.

It seems many of the people complaining that they turned off Buzz and people are still following them, or they are somehow still following other people, have no profiles.

I am really, really upset about this. I expect LJ to screw up, to be honest. I know that DW might make mistakes, but I expect they'll fix them really, really quickly. But Google has created something that hundreds or thousands of people have been quite vocal about not wanting, and Google hasn't responded.

[abyssinia4077.livejournal.com]

When I turned mine on to look I was automatically following 11 people, 3 of whom were listed as having public profiles (two of those are friends who work at google). I haven't gone through and disabled yet because I don't have time to sit down until later, but I'm pretty sure actually following those steps on the cnet page and creating a profile to then disable is, well, the only way to ensure you won't appear anywhere.

And, yeah, this is a really big screw up. Apparently google *has* responded in some fashion, but I'm not sure exactly how (I'm writing my preliminary exam now, so I'm barely keeping a fraction of an eye on all this bullshit)

[abyssinia4077.livejournal.com]

Wait, you might want to read this:

http://www.businessinsider.com/google-adding-two-privacy-features-in-response-to-bloggers-outrage-2010-2