Desperately seeking Self-Googlers Anonymous

Don’t Google yourself – it’s embarrassing. Of course, I’m saying this as a long-time self-Googler, a shameful secret that I’d like all of you to forget the moment you finish reading this post. Even if you do pop your name into Google now and then, you aren’t supposed to actually admit it to anyone – the hobby suggests some awful combination of desperation and narcissism that normally make people back away from you at parties. Do you really care what complete strangers think about you? (I don’t think I care, exactly, but for some reason I have to KNOW.) Do you even know how the Google rankings work? (I think I do, sort of, in that vague yet unspecified way that leaves me content but completely unwilling to explain it out loud in case I end up sounding stupid.)

Of course, as a writer with several articles posted online I have a variety of legitimate reasons for my name to come up in a search (also, an oddly spelled name is extremely useful for weeding out potential Google-clones). But I’ve also run into a desperately unfortunate picture from college, when I was quoted for a newspaper article and ended up with a photographer who apparently found the worst conceivable angle to shoot me from. I had been successfully repressing any and all memory of this picture, at least until Google dug it out of some dark corner of the Internet and helpfully reminded me of its existence just recently.

I suppose it could be worse – anyone on Facebook who might have embarrassing photos of me seems to take my just-short-of-death threats quite seriously – but every time I see the picture I swear I’m never going to put my name into Google again. This vow usually lasts about a week, maybe longer if I’m feeling particularly self-restrained for some reason.

Anyone know if there’s a Self-Googlers Anonymous out there? 

Google, the obsessive boyfriend

I’m starting to think that Google is like that classic overly-controlling boyfriend, the one that starts out knowing exactly what you want and need because he spends hours scrolling through all your Facebook and Twitter posts. He’s always there with exactly what you want, exactly when you need it – the weather for the week, movie times, whether you could find those gorgeous shoes somewhere else for a better price – and you start letting yourself trust him. Letting him do everything for you he wants to until he becomes a huge part of your life. Yahoo Search was a youthful fling, and we all know what a disaster Bing was, but Google … he just seems so perfect.

Then, of course, the trouble starts. First, he starts watching your searches, keeping a record of all the details and saying it’s all for you. He just wants to remember what you like, so he can help you even more than he is now. Then he gets jealous of Facebook – you should be on his social network, the one he made just for you, even if no one else is. You guys talk about shopping so much – why not have him to the shopping for you? He’s got a money account, just like this PayPal thing you always go to. You should be trusting *him* with your account information, not this other guy. It’s not like he doesn’t already have every single other piece of information you own.

Of course, the other option is Bing. So … I’m in trouble.