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Does anyone else think that we may be in a transition period of how we store/access our information and people are just really afraid of change? The recent trends seem to indicate that we are moving toward greater accessibility. For example, instead of just storing photos on your own machine, you can upload them to one of the various photo sites that allows you share them with others and access them from any computer as long as you have internet access. In my opinion, Google Desktop just takes this a step further by allowing you to store and access a wider variety of documents. Of course this greater flexibility does come at certain costs. It is more dangerous because you could potentially share more private information than a silly photo (although photos can be very private as well).
I personally feel that people have been overreacting to the potential dangers of enabling the sharing feature. It's not like you are forced to enable it. Each user also has complete control to limit what is shared and what isn't. The only danger is if the Google servers get hacked, but you face that danger with your email too.
I think the benefits outweigh the dangers in this situation. As our technology continues improves, I think more of the things that we are used to having on our own computer will be stored on servers and accessed through the internet. Imagine being able to run all of the applications you buy without having to install them on your computer. If you have multiple computers, you also wouldn't have to worry about installing the programs on each one because you would just need internet access. By this time we should also be able to do all kinds of fancy stuff on our cell phones/PDAs/whatever else they come up with by then with wireless internet access of course.
My opinions are based on using these features for personal use though. I understand that businesses have to be looked at differently. The public reaction to this new feature in Google Desktop has just kind of caught me off guard. I would have expected more people to think that is cool instead of responding with fear. It kind of reminds me of the early days of MP3s. Some people thought they were just a fad and would go away, but they went on to completely revolutionize the way we handle/listen to our music. I guess only time will tell what becomes of this new technology. I'm interested to hear what other people think...
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