well they may not be the NSA directly but don't kid yourself, that much processing power is being used at will by many of the three letter agencies for whatever purpose they see fit.

LOL. Google knows more about me than my own family.

I've never asked my family to find me an Australian feline, house maid with black socks, sipping wine and mopping the floor. {blush}... or something similar.

Don't act like YOU have never googled something similar.

Google knows our darkest secrets.

Facebook had adverts for stomach stapling on my home page the other day. Are they trying to tell me something?

Imagine how difficult it will be to run for public office in the near future. High school and college kids are uber-connected and there is bound to be a picture, video, or google search history that will sink any one seeking public office unless they lived in a cave until their 30s.

God knows I could never be president.

No comment. My wife has beat me for less. :P

I googled my screen name that I use here, and it's not the one that I use the most, but I do use on some other forums, 1380 results. Amazing on one hand scary on the other.

Any of the "free" services on the Internet have a price to be paid. You give up information about yourself in exchange for things like gmail, hotmail, Facebook etc.

I'm ok with that part of the bargain.

What is potentially a lot more disturbing is our reliance on the search algorithms to provide unbiased information. The tendency is to provide links that they "think" are appropriate to you. This, for example means you and I read different information about the same subjects.

For example, a 26 year old female in NYC is going to get different search results on say, Newt Gingrich, then a 62 year old male living in Orange County.

Of course it has always been that way depending on which newspaper/radio/tv/town-crier you got your news from.
But I fear most people aren't aware of the bias that the big search engines are building for them. Pretty soon you start living in your own little personal information bubble.

Very interesting read on this:

The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding From You
by Eli Pariser

+1

So what you guys are saying, is that if I decide to commit some sort of gangland slaying, armed robbery, or throw a M-80 in a mailbox I shouldn't post the glorious details of my adventure on Facebook, Google, or Youtube?  

You mean to tell me, that the internet will take that information and everybody in the world can just look at my exploits as they wish? 

This can't possibly be true......I'm not worried, I seriously doubt that cops have computers.

IF this is true Mr. Smarty Pants, why did Cisco let me name my network it it's not actually "mine".  

Does that go for gmail also?

I have no issues publishing text or images on the internet. My images are not copyrighted and anybody that wants to use them for ANY reason may do so. I don't care. What I *do* care about is people claiming my work as their own. Not cool.