Is Privacy Gone With The Wind?

Yesterday I posted about Google Alerts being a second Big Brother and I received some comments telling me about Google Maps (which lead people straight to your door with color maps) and Zapasearch, etc. One aspiring author mentioned she and her hubby had just discussed this issue and how she should handle it. Personally, I took a pseudonym that is nothing similar to my real name. Below I'll go into deeper discussion about the pros and cons of using a pseudonym. Secondly, I would advise renting a PO Box so that you do not give out the address of your private residence. If you send out a newsletter, you must provide an address or you can land in legal trouble if someone has a beef with your emails (or snail mail) and it's not supplied. With anything in life, there are pros and cons. While having a pseudonym helps me, I now realize that there are many other people who already have the name I adopted. I had googled it before selecting it and hadn't found anyone then, and obviously no one who was famous with the name "Ashley Ladd". Today, however, using a Zapasearch I found a page full of Ashley Ladds. I certainly don't mean to cause anyone else problems. However, I've come to the conclusion it's impossible to choose a name that is unique. I came to this conclusion at the day job many years ago. We have a database of more than 4 million names. Many people call and only give their name, certain we can identify them with such scanty information. Fortunately, or unfortunately, that is not the case. Why? Because even names that sound obscure usually have two or more people who share it. And that's in our data base alone. Usually I find page fulls of the same name when I do a name search. Years ago, when I was a much newer employee and user of this data base, I made the mistake of assuming the person who wrote a letter (and demanding a reply) was the same person I found in our data base, because the name seemed so obscure. A week later, I received an extremely nasty reply back that my letter's recipient wasn't the same person and to delete her name from our records as I had been so lax with the other person's data. Oops! I wasn't trying to be. Ever since, I've erred in the other direction. Of course, now we get nasty letters and phone that we've not responded to people. Thus for Google purposes, perhaps the news isn't as black as I painted it yesterday. Just because someone googles your name, they can't be sure they've located the right person. On the other hand, remember Terminator 1? When the Terminator merely went down the list of Sarah Connors in the phone book, killing every one so he could be sure he got the right one? <> Extreme case scenario, I know. I tend to worry. Blame it on my German roots. My dad's mother was a worry wort, too. Something else that worried me when I read it yesterday in a couple places was news of a global food shortage? One blog is talking about growing their own food. Not a bad idea ever. Fresh is good. Being prepared is good. My church preaches food storage and I used to be big into it, especially right before Y2K. So I've been googling articles this weekend about the rice and grain shortage, about how Costco and Sam's club are limiting the amount of rice they will sell. It doesn't sound quite as dire (for Americans and 1st world countries) as I first thought, but then I'm not an expert and plan to do more research later. In case that sounded cavalier, believe me, I'm very concerned for all the world's people. Whereas this will definitely hit my pocket book and with 6 mouths to feed in my household (13 if you count 2 dogs and 5 cats also), it won't be easy. However, I work for a charity that serves the poorest of the poor in the Caribbean and Latin America, which includes Haiti where food riots are going on as we speak. I receive concerned, and even accusing, letters daily claiming we (my charity) are not getting food into Haiti because of news articles other agencies published that food isn't getting into Haiti in general. I've been assured that my agency IS getting food into Haiti and getting it out to the people. Unfortunately, our agency alone cannot solve the entire problem, much as we'd love to do so and hard as we're trying. In Haiti alone, there are more than 7 billion destitute poor. I don't mean merely a little low on money so they can't go to the movies this week or even pay their electric bill. Most of these people live in shacks made of cardboard or rotted wood and rusty tin they scavanged from the local dump. They also subsist on the dumps for food and clothing and toys. Sometimes they don't eat even one small meal a day and count themselves lucky if they have just one small meal. This is pretty unimaginable in my house and my state. We may not always like what's in the pantry, but we won't starve. My kids complain there's "no food" when the pantries (2 of them in my house) and the fridge and deep freeze are all overflowing. Can you say spoiled? I can. (Hubby says the kids mean there's no handy snacks or fast food they don't have to cook first.) I also recently read a blog that compared weekly grocery bills in different countries. In the US, they averaged about $400.00 weekly and many other countries were at least $250.00 weekly. Someone please please tell my hubby as he's always on my back about spending too much money on food. I mean REALLY BIGTIME on my back. And I don't typically spend as much as $400.00 a week on our food bill. So how are you faring on food? Are you concerned about the global food crisis? What are you doing about it, if anything? One last quick question. We mentioned a couple days ago that black male cats are more lovable and loving than most cats. I agree from my personal observations. However, when I tried to google this for actual proof, I found nothing in the first four search pages. Does anyone have more information about this?

Google Alerts - Another Big Brother?

Nothing is private anymore...at least if you're on the Internet much. You know how we think the government knows everything about us? How they supposedly watch, listen in, and know every little thing we do? They're not the only ones. Have you heard of Google Alerts? If not, check it out at: http://www.google.com/alerts It's an awesome way to know if someone is talking about you or something close to your heart, on the web. It's the easy way to google yourself daily without having to waste time. Thus it can be a very valuable tool if you're an author or somebody who needs PR to help their livelihood. You know what is being said about you and who's saying it - daily. It's also a neat tool for bloggers to know which blogs or groups may be talking about you so you can pop in and join the discussion. On the surface, this is excellent, no? On the other...well??? I found a not-so wonderful review of one of my books yesterday. Believe me, I wasn't so thrilled to see it. However, I know reviews are subjective so it'll give me an excuse to drown myself in chocolate, soak in a warm bubble bath, and get over it. I can taste a chocolate Cold Stone ice cream right now... Everybody's allowed their opinion. (and I get an excuse to have ice cream) Stuff like finding a not so wonderful comment about you is one thing, but what if someone is spying on you for nefarious reasons unlike writing a book review, such as spying on competitors and enemies?

So, if you're dying to know what people are saying about you, or you want to spy on someone (not that I'm advising you to, just saying it's possible) visit the Google Alerts and follow simple instructions. It will ask for your email address, but hey, it already knows far more about you than that anyway.

Be aware it's not perfect - yet. Some of the alerts I receive are about other people named "Ashley" (with another last name) or "Ladd" with another first name. So you will probably have to wade through some unimportant info (to you) to get to the gems. I wouldn't be surprised if the government consults Google for information, when they want to check up on someone.