Buzz Out Loud Lounge forum: Google's New "Chrome" browser will hurt...Firefox?

Try the IE Tab plugin for FF. We have a lot of IE only web software at work. I use IE Tab and never have to leave FF.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1419

I've heard Netflix works with ietab (I think Tom mentioned it on the show).

Its a little scary when you remember a friend mentioning something in a conversation and later realize it was a podcast. Tom is kinda like a friend.....sorta...?

The "cookie" settings are under the tools > options > "under the hood" tab. It is fairly basic, but does let you restrict or block cookies, and you can review the cookie list and erase any or all of them. As cookies store logons to some websites as a convenience, I keep the cookies I recognize.

Chrome uses the "scripts" and other internet security settings of Windows, which can be accessed by tools > options > "under the hood" > "Change Proxy Settings", or through Windows connections.

Ad blocking is not there, but personally banner ads have never bothered me.

My explanation for killing Chrome [including all Registry entries it created] is simple .. after two days of putting it through trials f fire and ice lol. I wanted to try the Google browser, taking it for a a challenging cross-country test drive.

I did so and it confirmed my worst suspicions - the EULA allows Google's Chrome Toolbar to spy on and record literally everything you do on the internet. As usual, Google whips out the same defense by asserting it's nothing personal - it's just a precise profile of you, your life and behavior - in a statistical sorta kinda way. Well, I say "sorry but no sale this round... ."

The wonks at Microsoft wanted to have chips implanted in their brains. Gates said no way, no chips in my head, thanks very much. The chip people asked him why not? Gates replied privacy, humanity, etc .. the usual concerns .. but he added a very cool angle by closing the subject with (paraphrase) "what happens when those chips misfire, as chips will do upon occasion? Nah.. I'll leave the inserted chips deal to the young guns around here - they'll love it."

I'm two years older than Bill and feel strongly about privacy stuff too. Maybe I'm too old for stuff like Chrome - I just don't trust it.

Google's usual programs include EULAs that allow outrageous asaults on privacy, but with your own browser (FF or Opera). You needn't use Chrome, which has a lousy and fugly GUI in the bargain.

Both FF and Opera are exceptionally top quality, open source code browsers which allow us to customise privacy settings to our hearts' content - Opera can be a trickier browser to deploy but we all use Firefox and feel completely comfortable deploying its strictest privacy settings and globally cheered privacy add-on's like the brilliant SSL tunneling option offered by www.customizegoogle.com which can do things like make our gmails and gtalks invisible to and unrecordable by Google and only accessible in that sense by you and your correspondant(s).

No such luck with Chrome. Its blatant disregard for your privacy (particularly by using its default settings which Google knows most everyone will accept without questioning in the d/l and install program).

You might say Google is thereby abusing our trusting behavior in a malicious manner. They're very smart and know people never study EULA's - particularly long and complex ones, with off-EULA links to huge Privacy Policy and Terms of Service web documents that Google incorporates into (and as part of) the EULAs of invasive programs like Chrome.

You can wade through the 300+ pages of legal documents that say - in essence "you have no rights to do anything here but we'll let you play around with the new browser so we can profile your unique behavior in the maze for awhile - of course, for your own good, we can do anything here cos we built the maze and cos we said so. Have fun!"

So, you can make a strong case that this program was created with malicious intent to invade Americans' privacy, by disguising itself as just another email and toolbar service. I don't believe this position to be melodramatic - I believe it to be an analysis of fact.

OMG is Google really so incredibly interested in little ole you personally? Nope, no way, not a shot in sh*t, not in the slightest. But they care about your unique behavior and personality - hey, they're in the advertising biz - it's mission-critical to their bottom line to target their AdSense customers' ad's with precision.

If they fail at this business of personality profiling by shrewd application of social psychology-based Artificial Intelligence programs, no one clicks through and Google goes out of business. Well, ok - it'd take awhile lol.

One of the wonderful things that Firefox' customizegoogle dot com add-on does is to disappear Google's links, ad's, sending your stats to Google and so forth if you tell the program to do so. Chrome breaks this and similar privacy programs, or makes them very difficult to program in the usual, easy FF manner.

Chrome has a more difficult time hacking Opera - a far more secure, complex and challenging browser for privacy hackers to crack. And hey, it's got the most inherently attractive GUI of them all, IMHO. I set Opera as my default browser / email program, and switch over to FF with all my favorite plug-in's for browsing.

IE? Sure, I'm on Microsoft Windows Vista on two machines - one lean and mean Business 32 bit and the other a hotrod gaming Ultimate 64 bit. So I must run IE at least once monthly on patch Tuesdays. Just like Apple Mac OS X folks must use Safari upon occasion.

IE is a core, proprietary component of the Windows o/s so you have no choice and must use it at least occasionally to run critical Windows programs. Safari is also a core, proprietary component of the OS X o/s so you must use it at least occasionally to run critical OS X programs. The Chrome BETA is also designed to be the core, proprietary component of the as-yet-unnamed Google desktop / laptop o/s ... so you WILL have to use it at least occasionally etc... .

The early BETA release of Chrome is to amass a useful tonnage of guinea pigs ...erm... "users" to test drive what Google has in store in an o/s to go up against Windows and OS X - I believe they've already stated it will be a Linux-based, proprietary o/s.

I think they should've first released a BETA of the proposed o/s
with their Chrome browser, rather than tease with just the proprietary browser first as they've done. It's a lousy tease -
so far, haven't found anyone who's gung-ho to replace IE, Safari, FF, or Opera with Chrome. Google is very aware of this negative attitude and doesn't really care because you'll have to deploy Chrome to use the upcoming Google o/s.

The malicious and sneaky business re "Chrome First" is because they legalized it with an absurd EULA which you and I signed and which essentially gives Google the right to snoop on and maintain records of everything we do, everything we search, everything we say vocally or in writing on GTalk, everything we write, all the programs we choose to download or otherwise install on our HDD's, what we and our correspondents discuss in email, phone or IM dialog etc.

Yes, they've done this before, but never to the extent this EULA authorizes.

Can we take actions to defend ourselves against all of this Chrome-based "spying"? [I prefer "profiling" cos that's the type of spying that's going on]

Yes, we can defend etc but it would require using powerful 3rd party programs and lots of time on an on-going basis. Who needs the bother? Who has the time? And those questions assume we users are all fluent in hacking Google programs - if only out of self-defense from the new Borg. Even more time will have to be invested in learning how to hack Chrome.

I'll stick with the only two, major open-source browsers (FF and Opera) for now, because they're great fun, their GUIs are really attractive, their programs are more secure than their competitors' and unlike their competitors, they're not trying to sell me stuff I don't want or educate me about stuff that I don't wanna know about.

I've stayed away from the two, not-so-hot, proprietary browsers (IE and Safari) for years and can't see that changing anytime soon. I tried the third browser of this type and in this class, Chrome, but I didn't see any reason to use it after a couple days of "serious and difficult experimenting" - Chrome failed miserably.

So, I deleted the BETA Chrome after giving it a solid two day trial. I found that, for my use at least, its features aren't competitive with those offered by Firefox and Opera.

"Both FF and Opera are exceptionally top quality, open source code browsers..."

"I'll stick with the only two, major open-source browsers (FF and Opera)..."

As a clarification, Opera is NOT open source. It wasn't even free up until version 5.0 (2000) and was ad-supported until version 8.5 (2005), which is probably why it didn't develop a huge market share despite coming on the scene much earlier than Firefox. Of course, it is free to use now, and it is very nice, but it is most certainly proprietary, not open source.

I use Firefox and it comes with Google search. I know how to
change to the few options available, which is the best and safest
search engine?

jgarret9@bellsouth.net

I have been using it all afternoon and it is much faster than IE7. I like to have many tabs open and it is a godsend that I don't loose all of the tabs just because it crashed.

For the person that said that it does not have a zoom feature; it does- press the control and either the + or - key. If you had watched the demo before installing it you would have been told this.

Regarding the big brother factor. The IE8 Beta looks promising but it also is tracking what you are doing....

I can't speak for anyone else but since IE comes with Windows, IE will forever be on my PC. I prefer Firefox to IE b/c of all the security features built into IE that make it load pages slower. However, I find that Firefox still cannot display all of the pages that I visit correctly and as a result, I really do need 2 browsers on my PC... and IE always seems to be able to properly load these pages that Firefox cannot. I have downloaded Google Chrome and I absolutely love it... in fact, I love it so much that for me, it will replace my Firefox browser sooner or later... because it definitely will not take precedence over IE. Most pages are optimized for IE and it is the most commonly used browser and so, most web designers will ensure that IE will be able to properly display their websites. The fact of the matter is, I only need 2 web browsers and IE is here to stay. So for me, my second browser will either be Firefox or Chrome and I have to say, Chrome looks like it will usurp Firefox as my primary web browser.