For the past many years, I used Google’s Webmaster Tools to help me optimize my various Web sites for Google’s search engine, and help me administer Google’s spidering of my sites.

In that same time frame, I’ve also sent automated nightly sitemaps of my sites to Google, to ensure that it would be aware of each day’s updates.

Over the years, I’ve also used four different Google GMail accounts as anonymous proxies, to protect my online privacy when corresponding with possibly dubious strangers — being careful not to [more...]

I’ll bet that most of my readers use Google’s search engine.

And that many of them also watch videos on YouTube.

And use Gmail.

And Google Maps.

And maybe even Google Calendar.

They might even own [more...]

Years ago, my Uncle Dom, stricken with debilitating asthma, discovered that the World Wide Web would allow him to virtually explore the world.

Visiting places that his health would never have allowed him to go.

And making contact with long-lost relatives and friends in the old country.

All from the [more...]

“To err is human — to really mess things up requires a computer.”

That’s a popular old saying.

But it’s usually not a computer’s fault when something gets really messed up.

It’s almost always the fault of a computer programmer or computer user.

Because, computers are [more...]

Regular readers of this Journal know that — despite this self-named Web site, and the fact that I love to learn about all kinds of new technologies — I actually own very few pieces of technology.

No smart phone.

Not even a cell phone.

No X-Box. [more...]

Would it bother you to learn that the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) has partnered with Google, the search company, to allow the company to help the government agency spy on people?

To be perfectly honest, we highly suspect, but don’t know for sure, that such a relationship exists.

Because, at this point in time, [more...]

I don’t know if it’s really true, or if it’s just an urban legend, but, years ago, I heard that a reporter once jokingly challenged Albert Einstein’s intelligence by quizzing him “How many feet are in a mile?”

And Einstein supposedly replied something like, “I have rooms full of books that contain that kind of information! Why would I want to fill my head with facts that I can quickly look up whenever I need them?”

That incident supposedly happened about sixty years ago [more...]

Thanks to regular reader and old friend, MALsPa, for bringing this story to my attention.

Google has said that it’s currently only affecting 0.08% (about 1/12th of one percent) of its users, but I’m guessing that fact comes as little comfort to the 150,000 Gmail users whose email accounts have been [more...]