New Google Chrome Browser

[kesey]

For those who like new tools, the Google Chrome Browser is here:

http://gears.google.com/chrome/

I've been playing with it for the last hour or so and it is working well. The various Tabs allow independent working and apparently one of its aims is to manage computer memory well.

So far so good, as noted by the 85 year old who said he wanted to live forever.

[acidzebra]

It's pretty snappy, I'm testing it now too. But I'm addicted to firefox extensions. Like adblocker.

On a side note, I'm a little disconcerted at how easily it nabbed my firefox password cache and imported it. (this all from my corporate XP box, it'll take a while to percolate down to linux or OSX)

[Taylor514ce]

I'd never use a Google browser, for fear they'd "data mine" my every mouse click, feed it to advertisers, and regurgitate it back to me with creepily "relevant" ads. No thank you. Google has stolen enough outright for me to give them any tacit permission to monitor me online.

[acidzebra]

Originally Posted by Taylor514ce

I'd never use a Google browser, for fear they'd "data mine" my every mouse click, feed it to advertisers, and regurgitate it back to me with creepily "relevant" ads. No thank you. Google has stolen enough outright for me to give them any tacit permission to monitor me online.

I usually ignore vague unsubstantiated paranoia while knowing that corporations are not humanity's friends, but what exactly has Google stolen from you?

[astrodad]

This browser renders pages very fast. Even TUAW.COM, also known as "the most god-awful collection of too-big images and links and references from a billion other hosts" is pretty quick.

I also have too much invested in the Firefox add-ons, but since Firefox is part of the core of this, I wonder if that will come in a later beta.

[Taylor514ce]

Originally Posted by acidzebra

I usually ignore vague unsubstantiated paranoia while knowing that corporations are not humanity's friends, but what exactly has Google stolen from you?

The content from several websites and fora I've created.

[Dave Berk]

Actually I'm writing this message from Chrome and while it's fast, it's not as fast as Opera, IMHSO (s for subjective).
Mobileread, for example, renders for me much faster in Opera than in Chrome.

[NatCh]

But it's much faster in Chrome than FF3, I think.

[acidzebra]

Originally Posted by Taylor514ce

The content from several websites and fora I've created.

Wait, you're offended that they've spidered your (publicly available) websites for inclusion in their database to preserve the information long after you've abandoned it, like pretty much every search engine out there, not to mention archive.org? This is "stealing"?

Aside from being one of the more bizarre things I have heard on the internet, have you heard of robots.txt?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robots.txt

Oh no! Your words are in my offline browser cache! Dooooom!

You might also want to check out
http://www.google.com/support/webmas....py?topic=8459

[igorsk]

Originally Posted by NatCh

But it's much faster in Chrome than FF3, I think.

Isn't everything faster than FF? :P
/me ducks

[Dave Berk]

Also, a rather major annoyance is the fact that when I'm zooming in on a page, it's still restricted to its original size. Even FF3 don't do that anymore, and for people with bad eyesight, good zooming is a must.

[Taylor514ce]

Originally Posted by acidzebra

Wait, you're offended...

Wait, is that why they spider sites? For the preservation of information? How altruistic of them.

Wait, are we supposed to have a serious conversation with sentences that begin with a sarcastic flair?

I've been a web developer since there was a web, a CompuServe sysop before that, a BBS hacker and coder before that, and an application developer before THAT. Of course I've heard of robots.txt. Intellectual property is not an "opt-in" right (or opt-out, depending on how you view it).

My copyrighted work is mine to control, not only the method of distribution, but the use to which it is put. When Google caches my entire site, then serves up complete pages via their "view cached image link", uses my content to fuel their advertising engine, or when they take images out of my pages to serve up separately via images.google.com - they are violating my copyrights and have stolen my intellectual property, and my copyright is NOT invalidated because I don't have a robots.txt file. Or even if I do - again, that has nothing to do with my rights.

[acidzebra]

So you put your work in the public domain, open to all, with zero controls, and... what?

If you want to control your work, that is your right. Putting it on the freaking internet for all to see and copy is not my idea of control.

[Taylor514ce]

Where did I say I've put my work in "the public domain"? I think you've confused "public domain" with "publicly accessible".

Not locking my door doesn't give you PERMISSION to rob me.

[acidzebra]

So the internet is a private place? Who owns it?

Google?

I'm sorry, I'm done with comparing digital media to physical objects and places. Copying a digital unit of information (like I carelessly do with my browser cache every day) does not deprive you of said unit.