Untitled - witz cultural

41AN lNrRoDUcrloNFar more important a problem with digital searches, as Eugene Provenzowarned two decades ago, is not what necessary information we can t find butwhat personal information governments and corporations can near-instantlydiscover about us. One example will suffice. Google, which has so shapedthe world of education and scholarship, is currently offering free e-mailaccounts with enormous storage (1 gigabyte), and the company urges usersnever to discard anything: "You never know when you might need a messageagain, but with traditional webmail services, you delete it and it's gone forever.With Gmail, you can easily archive your messages instead, so they'll stillbe accessible when you need them." According to a website whose URL isgmail-is-too-creepy.com, "Google admits that even deleted messages willremain on their system, and may also be accessible internally at Google, foran indefinite period of time." The danger, according to Public InformationResearch, which created the site, is that the company pools its information,keeps it indefinitely, and can share it with anyone they wish. 'Al1 that's requiredis for Google to'have a good faith beliefthat access, preservation ordisclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to protect the rights,property or safety of Google, its users or the public." These privacy advocatesclaim that the company's statements about terms of use and privacy "meanthat all Gmail account holders have consented to allow Google to show anyand all email in their Gmail accounts to any official from any governmentwhatsoever, even when the request is informal or extralegal, at Google's solediscretion." Moreover, nothing in Gmail's stated policy darifies if it will saveand index incoming mail from those who have not agreed to use their system.When one uses Google as a search tool, its software, like that of many othersites, places a so-called cookie with a unique ID number on your computerthat does notexpire until2038. Bythat means itkeeps track ofany searchyouhave ever made. According to various privacy advocates and consumer groups,connecting e-mail to this powerful tool creates the inevitability of enormousabuses by corporate and government interests, many of whom are not subjectto U.S. law-this last a particularly relevant point since two-thirds ofGoogle users live outside the United States, many in countries without privacylaws. No free lunch.Interactive or ErgodiclReaders may have noticed that in the preceding discussions ofelectronic media I have not employed the words interqctiveand interqctivity. As many commentators during the pastdecade and a halfhave observed, these words have been used so often and sobadly that they have little exact meaning anymore. fust as chlorophyll was