For months, I’ve been clicking that “Remind me later” button when going to Youtube and being asked to link a Google account or whatever. The other day I went on and the option was gone. A note saying that I had to create a Google in order to have a Youtube account was there instead
Please tell me I have a virus trying to get information from me. I don’t want to create a Google account
If not, and that’s a real message, then WTF is a Google account??
Seriously, fuck that shit. I already have a Youtube account, I don’t want a god damn Google account, whatever that is. I use Google to look for porn and weird pictures or random stuff, I don’t need to have it tell me what videos I should be watching when I input things into its search bar
As a programmer I can understand why Google doesn’t want to maintain a separate login & password for youtube and gmail. It’s a PITA for the IT dept and costs money.
However, they could have done this switch over in a more open and transparent way. Ambushing people one by one with nag screens sucks.
I use a broad range of Google products (Gmail, YouTube, Picasa, Googe Docs) and an Android phone, and I find it very convenient to have one account that lets me access them all. I can understand the need to sometimes compartmentalize your on-line activities, but I suspect that the majority of users will find this a plus, as I do.
I don’t see how logging in with a Google account is any worse that logging in with an old YouTube account. Is it just the inconvenience of remembering a new login instead of the old one?
For me, it’s the inconvenience of having to log out of my Gmail in order to log in under one of my alternate YouTube accounts. It also used to be inconvenient the other direction, but you can set up Gmail to open multiple accounts.
And if you wonder why I have multiple accounts in each:
I have a SPAM email address, an online-only email address, and a real life email address that uses my real name and looks more elegant. As for YouTube, I have my regular account that I use for comments, an account wI only use for uploads so that any comments on them are kept separate and the name is more appropriate to the contend, and an account for watching a certain type of video. Having a separate account for the latter means similar videos always show up in its Recommended videos list, but doesn’t pollute my recommended videos list. It’s actually a better searching method, since people tend not to label these videos very well.
I’ve noticed on occasion when I try to make a comment on a youtube video, I am asked to sign in. When I click on the “Sign In” link, I am automatically signed in without having to do anything. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I now realize this is because I have a gmail account linked to youtube. And I didn’t even know it!
You could use different browsers. For instance, log into one account with Firefox, another account with Chrome, and yet another with (shudder) Internet Explorer. Let each browser remember the account it is assigned. That way all you need to do is launch the browser you need and you’re in.
That’s what I do. Perhaps I’m paranoid, but it made me uneasy that my firstnamelastname.location@gmail . com address had to be tied to content clearly indicating what my family looks like, where my daughters go to school, what’s where in certain rooms of the house, etc.
I thought the same thing … that I had come across some kind of scam page. It looks like you haven’t reached the point where they demand your phone number too.
Covered_In_Bees! linked to two threads I started recently regarding this stuff, one wondering if it was real and one requesting alternatives to gmail. Those threads cover some of my reasons for not wanting my online activities linked together for the benefit of Google … and yes, it is for their benefit, not for mine, no matter how they spin it.
I am now completely free of Google accounts. Switched my disposable email to Hotmail. I can still watch YouTube videos without being logged in but will have to find another place to upload things if I ever want to. I stopped using Google for search a couple of years ago … I use Scroogle for quick and dirty searches (it gives you Google results without being tracked) and Yahoo for the more complex ones. Never used any other Google service.
Eh. Sign of the times. Haven’t found a reason to grumble about it. If I don’t like the suggestions, I can just ignore them. I’ve been doing this with Amazon for years.
I am surprised it has taken Google this long to implement this. Yahoo did the same thing with Flickr, and it was pretty annoying, too. I never bothered setting up a Youtube account, because I just watch stuff when it is linked, not much more than that.
Turble: What difference does it make that you are doing a Yahoo search over a Google search? In the one case Google gets your information and in the other Microsoft does. I’m not trying to start a fight. I just don’t understand the mindset.
I’m over 60 and been doing this computer stuff since the 1960s. I have a nook, three GPSs, a Roku player, a digital video camera, an MP3 player, a sous vide system, etc., so it’s not that I’m a technophobe … but I don’t have a cell phone (not even a disposable, non-trackable one) because I find it to be too intrusive on my privacy.
There is no benefit to me to allow one company to compile a database of my personal searches, purchases, interests, movements, whatever. I don’t click on ads – and targeting ads is the real reason they want to link all the data. I’d say there’s too much advertising in the world already … and I don’t really care to make it easier for someone to try to target me personally.
Add in the kind of personal stuff Facebook and Google Buzz released … and the potential for further invasions of privacy … I just don’t care to participate.
“In the past year, The Wall Street Journal’s “What They Know” series has revealed that popular websites install thousands of tracking technologies on people’s computers without their knowledge, feeding an industry that gathers and sells information on their finances, political leanings and religious interests, among other things.”
