In a recent article in Businessweek (http://buswk.co/oCzrsv), we learn that Google Chairman Eric Schmidt just admitted the company intends to be an ‘identity service”. What does this mean? Well a quick recap of the article is that it seems that Google+ was set up for one reason, to capture people’s social ID to be used in more targeted advertising to enhance commerce driven by Google search. So your secret or not so secret posts and profiles would determine what search results get dished to you and most likely influence what products and services you’d be willing to pay for. Sound smart? Sound scary? You decide for yourself. But the innocent days of social networks as mainly about letting friends connect with each other is over. As a marketer it is a dream come true, to further tap the minds of consumers. But as a user, it makes me really rethink what I post on Google+. At the end of the day, Google being the identity gate keeper that owns our identities will be questionable to many people, probably even more the Facebook’s privacy issues.
– Lance
