Data Detox 2: Is Google Your BFF?

The purpose of the second day of the data detox journal was to compare what you do and the information you share and search for on the internet and if you share all of that with your best friend. For me, it was about half and half, many of the things I look for and search or use I usually tend to share with my friends as well. The next part was to “see what Google sees” which was basically just showing how much information Google saves from what you do on there. Then I was asked to delete all my past activity, which was actually pretty hard for me. I think that it was hard for me because I actually like that Google knows me well enough to show me all of my interests. For example, for the first day, it had us delete our history in whichever search engine we use and that made me realize how convenient and easy it is to search things when Google already knows what I have searched in the past. It was also a bit annoying having to sign back into all of my accounts. It’s much easier when Google saves my passwords for me. It did make me realize how much control Google has over my daily life, I use it for pretty much everything and it has so many tabs on me that it’s a bit unnerving. However, the convenience of it makes me reluctant to get rid of it.