> Do I really want my Internet search engine to "know me"?

In a perfect world, where your personal information couldn't be used against you or for someone else's gain, why not? But we don't live in that perfect world. I agree, this kind of thing is scary. Between Google's increasingly lame results (yes I realize this is an attempt to curb that issue) and the idea that Google is and will become increasingly aggressive about knowing who I am, I feel like it's time for me to give up Google.

This is the core question of the Information Age. Companies like Google are in position to gather a boat ton of information about you if you're not actively avoiding them. With this information, they can provide "futuristic" services like a global search engine that knows your search preferences and provides contextual advertisements, and that's just the tip of the iceberg. Imagine a world where, upon arriving at your travel destination, your Android phone indicates the places near your hotel you'll want to eat or drink at. Or, during a month where you've got a lot of Work meetings scheduled, Google Calendar suggests that you and your friends seem to all be free this Friday evening and you could catch the film you've all been posting about. That sounds pretty cool.

But there's a very thin line between "helpful" and "annoying", especially if there's no easy way to opt-out. And there's no way to know if Google is providing your data to governments or large corporations. Who all knows about me, and how much do they know?

At least the future won't be boring.

That's exactly how I felt. A small step, yes, but it's another small step in the direction of "wow, Google knows me better than I do." In the ideal world where corruption didn't happen, this sort of thing is awesome... I'd imagine it'd be pretty nice to be able to Google my life (and friends).

Do you want Siri to "really know you"? For a service that you want to give you answers as relevant as possible, the answer is probably yes. Although, I'd still like to be be able to choose the de-personalized version, and Google seems to be offering this, too.

No, but I imagine you want to find what you're looking for. Google knowing about you is part of what makes this possible.