14 DAY TRIAL // It’s not exactly a surprise that Google wants to integrate all its products, to create one unified universe where you can easily go from one tool to another. The recent announcement that Google+ users would be able to email you without even knowing your address falls into the same category.
It has done it before. However, the scandal following the modifications from the YouTube comments section, for which you now have to own a Google+ account, was proof enough that people don’t really like to be pushed towards such changes overnight.
The recent changes, just as the ones before and the ones before them, aren’t necessarily bad. You’ll probably find it useful, at one point, to be able to send a message to someone you have in your circles, but don’t know the email address of. It’s a useful tool and if handled correctly, as all things related to social media, you could still keep some of your privacy.
Of course, for this to happen, you need to know how to fiddle with privacy settings. And that’s where the problem stands. For me, for instance, the new option was set to “Anyone on Google+” by default. Others found theirs was set on “Circles.”
And while I knew where to look to make sure my privacy was protected, there are millions of people out there that do not have the knowledge to make these changes. Studies have shown this time and time again – many Internet users never go to the trouble of making any type of changes to the privacy settings, completely ignoring this important section.
Under these circumstances, Google should keep introducing all these features they think the world needs, but they should not push them on users in such a manner. Instead of allowing them to opt out of the new features, Google should let everyone opt in.