Testing the eyes of Big Google

I am getting more and more concerned about the Google.

When I send an email to someone with deeply personal stuff in it, the Googlater parses it and throws up advertising based on the content of the message. This I don't like. The fine print says no worries mate no one sees it it's just our friendly robot who likes you no matter what you say as long as he can repeat some of it in public in the form of ads for condoms, erectile dysfunction, underwear, NASCAR, things with my son's name in them (!!! NOT OKAY !!!)

This I don't trust. Anonymous or not, there, next to my private, possibly intimate or sensitive or open to interpretation words, are their dissection and reconfigured relevance splayed out on the table with them. Raw and in the open. As far as I'm concerned.

But no one looks at it. But it is there, just a button push, a line of code, a change of logic away from everyone. All packaged up and analyzed and reconfigured into statements intended to persuade, distract, entice someone to expend energy and attention span to addressing.

And then there is the real Big Brother. Street view: I can see my car in the driveway of my apartment, and my best friend's pickup next to his front porch, and anything else within the hemispheric range of the snapshot dome of the Googley eye.

So here is an attempt to embed one of these..


View Larger Map

Someone's dog wonders what The Google wants...

This is in the "The kids will take care of it" category

CFL bulbs. Great green idea. Lasts for 10 years, uses much less electricity, the light's a little different, but such a good idea!

Then there's always that little aside "..although they do contain a small amount of Mercury". But if you're just careful for the next 7-10 years, no problem! Except you will still have to do something with them. Millions of them. The following is an excerpt from the DEP website here in Maine. Makes me a bit uncomfortable.

----------- FAQ ----------------------------------
What if I accidentally break a fluorescent bulb in my home?

fluorescent bulbs

The most important thing to remember is to never use a vacuum . A standard vacuum will spread mercury containing dust throughout the area as well as potentially contaminating the vacuum. What you should do is:

* Keep people and pets away from the breakage area so that the mercury in the powder inside the bulb is not accidentally tracked into other areas.
* Ventilate the area by opening windows.
* Wear appropriate personal protective equipment, such as rubber gloves, safety glasses, old clothing or coveralls, and a dust mask (if you have one) to keep bulb dust and glass from being inhaled.
* Carefully remove the larger pieces and place them in a secure closed container, preferably a glass container with a metal screw top and gasket seal like a canning jar.
* Next, begin collecting the smaller pieces and dust. You can use a disposable broom and dustpan or two stiff pieces of paper to scoop up pieces.
* Put all material into the glass container. Pat the area with the sticky side of duct, packing or masking tape. Wipe the area with a damp cloth or paper towels to pick up fine particles.
* Put all waste and materials used to clean up the bulb in the glass container and label it “Universal Waste - broken lamp”.
* Take the container for recycling as universal waste. To determine where your town has made arrangements for recycling of this type of waste, call your town office or check out the Maine Department of Environmental Protection website at http://www.maine.gov/dep/rwm/hazardouswaste/uwmunicipalmaster.xls

The next time you replace a bulb, consider putting a drop cloth on the floor so that any accidental breakage can be easily cleaned up.
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Holy crap. How many hazmat suits does it take to change a light bulb???

BTW - I am NOT a "let's rape the landscape for money" person. I am a proud and dedicated tree-hugger and environmentalist, and strongly believe in the need for 'green' priorities (even though that's becoming a new buzzword, with the potential to be abused, e.g. by the oil companies already..) I just think we've really got to pay attention, especially to the scope of things. Like the millions of CFL's we'll have to hazmat to the dump eventually..

Strategery

Tactician in Iraq : "They're not stupid - we killed all the stupid ones."

Why is the writing on the wall invisible to so many?

Re - keeping us safe: George W. Bush was president on Sept 10, 2001.

Wondering if you're really here

Just a passing thought. That passes each time I go to the supermarket, or any store with automatic doors. It sometimes seems like the doors don't open for me as quickly as they could... What 's that all about? What if they didn't open at all? Should I take it personally? Is this a flaw in my molecular structure? Am I just not paying enough attention to the door, so it's giving me the brush off, or at least a hard time?

And then there's that far off hidden valley where all the other socks go. Not far from the one where all the plastic lids are.

9/11/2001. The day that "My Pet Goat" took priority over the biggest national tragedy we have ever experienced. The scariest part is how inept and clueless our president is compared to the precision and awesome power of the fearless and horrifically focused terrorists. And that he claims he will be able to hunt down and capture them with his posse of cowboys. How many billions of dollars have we funneled into this use of brute force , draining the wealth and destroying the youth of our nation?

Into the ether...

Just wrote up a really nice long post... It was really great, really. It's gone now. It is in the ether, lost in a flurry of reconfiguring my settings.... damn. It was a reallly good one, too. Really good. Poetic, humorous, insightful, honest, forthright, well typed, nice font. Everything you'd want in a post. Really.

Dammit.

So, okay, the funny and insightful bit was about things that get stuck in your head. musicus stickiosis. The Flintstones. Ha. Try to get rid of that one now. Quick, Andy Griffith. Now Tom Jones, It's Not Unusual. Now the Beatles, Norwegian Wood. Let that one roll around in there for a while...

Jingles. That's what the evil-doers do with this syndrome. Antidote for the 21st century: Keychain, small flash memory, earbud, USB for filling it up. Really small. Next stickiosis, whatever evil clogs your mind, grab your keys, get your handy antidote and stick it in your ear! Ahhhh. Purge. Pushed out by the beginning of the Pastoral Symphony, or Steely Dan, or the Beatles, or Michael Bolton. Wait! Forget that last one.

Remember, you heard it here first.
Just $9.95 plus shipping and handling. But wait! That's not all. If you act now you can receive, free of charge, a bunch of keys for your keyring that are guaranteed not to open anything! Be the first on you block.

Then there was the poetic stuff. About a small tree in the marsh that is already showing it's fall foliage colors. I love autumn, but this year I have important tasks to be accomplished and I don't want to hurry the earth in it's orbit. I want to get these things done before more precious time slips by, time that, now that my autumn is upon me, seems more and more valuable.

That's it.

As of this step in my blogging evolution, I am going public. If you find me, leave me a comment. I'll try to keep up and learn how to engage in dialog through this tool. It's all the rage now. Prime time, you know.