What’s this horrible “shared endorsement” business of Google using your name and image for ads?

Imagine Google searching through your whole life on the internet and pulling up all your likes and endorsements and comments.

Then they pair them with your name and the photo from your Google+ profile, and display them as ads. That sounds positively….evil, doesn’t it? Remember that time you “liked” your friend’s band, even though you hadn’t seen him since college? What was the band called, PedoNecrophiliaBestiality or something?

Now stop imagining, and go change your account settings.

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How you want your Google+ settings if you don’t want to Share Endorsements.

If you don’t want your profile information and comments used in ads, uncheck the box next to the phrase “Based upon my activity, Google may show my name and profile photo in shared endorsements that appear in ads.”.

The box may be already checked by default if you’re a Google Plus user, or you may find it unchecked ( I did).

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You can read more at this blog post on the Grey Lady. Or you can just make the change, then start freaking out about everything ELSE Google is doing.

For example, did you know a link to your YouTube account shows up on your Google+ profile? I didn’t.

And you have to unhook them at your YouTube account- you can’t do it from Google+. Police that shit up, and good luck in the cyberpunk dystopia we live in.

*you think I’m kidding. I actually had friends in high school whose band was called PNB, short for PedoNecrophiliaBestiality. You can’t make this stuff up.

This entry was posted in Infuriating news of the cyberpunk dystopia we live in. on by .

About Suzanne Forbes

Suzanne Forbes is a traditionally trained figurative artist who makes documentary art of queer culture and Berlin life. She also works in mixed media. She is a former New Yorker who immigrated to Berlin with her third husband and their two cats. Her work is crowdfunded by the support of her Patrons on Patreon; you could help! In previous lives Suzanne was a graffiti artist in downtown NY, a courtroom artist for CBS and CNN, a penciller for DC Comics on Star Trek, and a live-drawing chronicler of Bay Area alternative culture.

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