Google's Good to Know

Good to Know is a nice effort by Google to close the yawning chasm between what Joe Punter understands about online user profiling and what actually happens in the big bad digital marketing ecosystem.

While this seems nice and straightforward, I would still wager cold hard cash that pretty much any normal person would still glaze over almost immediately. For the bright, somewhat technical audience who are just a bit naive about the prevailing online business model, I'm sure it will be very interesting and helpful.

One thing I noticed was the use of, "we don't sell your data to anyone else". This is a handy nuance - would I feel better knowing Google were sharing my data with other parties, as long as they're not directly profiting from it?

Still, I continue to be impressed at Google - their way of working reminds me somewhat of Nokia and Cisco in days gone by. "We won't engage with regulatory or trade bodies, and we won't discuss our plans. But when we execute those plans, you will see they were good plans and you will do things the same way." Google's attempts to make their privacy policies consumer-comprehensible and early adoption of the AdChoices icon does indicate they're taking the changing cookie regulatory situation seriously. (Even if they don't talk to anyone about it, and I can only assume they're lobbying at the highest level for some kind of rethink.)