Big Problems With Google Chrome

JeevesBond's picture

He has: 3,956 posts

Joined: Jun 2002

Google's Chrome browser was launched yesterday and it's already popular. One source is saying that Chrome already has a market share of 2.6%, not bad growth for one day.

However, minor annoyance of no GNU/Linux port aside, there are some big problems with Chrome:

  1. Google gets perpetual, exclusive rights to all content you submit, post or display on or through Chrome;
  2. Google update is installed along with Chrome and needs a registry edit and removal of a scheduled task to remove it;
  3. every install of Chrome gets a unique ID, when a user logs in to their Google account (using Chrome), the account is permanently linked to the Chrome installation;
  4. all URLs including any mis-typed URLs entered into the address bar are sent to Google (however, this may be switched off);
  5. an enterprising Slashdotter has looked through the source code of Chrome and found that it transmits almost everything the user does, including opening and closing tabs, memory usage, whether the window is maximised, etc. (frankly though, this needs checking and confirmation);

I have an inkling that most won't be worried about these issues until something like the Viacom vs. Youtube court case comes around again. If they didn't collect the data in the first place, it wouldn't be a problem. Smiling

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decibel.places's picture

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ah, but that is Google's business model - data

mostly (they say) as anonymous data..

What if you use Tor/Vidalia? guess the data collection is coded right into Chrome..

There is a option to "share" data with Google or not - what is the difference?

I have to say that Chrome is blazingly fast, on a bloated Dreamweaver table site (or a pumped up Drupal site with lots of Flash widgets (yah, my personal site...))

What about other companies? - I installed itunes, and Apple alerted me when Safari for Windows was available (I was glad) and keeps bugging me - but turning it off is probably simpler than removing Google update

Like it or not, I think we are headed for more and more data collection and profiling as a way of life, for one thing, I think that will be the basis for the "next" wave of Web 3.0 and personalized mass sites are not very workable without a detailed user profile, with lots of data (what topping you like on your pizza, etc)

It's no longer about "pushing" content and information, but also about "pulling" it too...

Greg K's picture

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Regarding #1, it looks like already did an Undo on that. The link from the article to the EULA (http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html) is an EULA with the extra terms no longer there...

-Greg

JeevesBond's picture

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Regarding #1, it looks like already did an Undo on that.

Nice catch, apparently Google copy and paste most of their EULAs!

They made it into the Most Laughable Terms of Service on the Net article on Valleywag before changing it though. Smiling

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pr0gr4mm3r's picture

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I wonder if the EULA was even serious. Remember that this is still beta software.

I must say that the little privacy is an issue, with me at least. It's not anonymous if it's linked to your Google account.

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I don like chrome. Mozilla is good for me

Megan's picture

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JeevesBond wrote:
  1. Google gets perpetual, exclusive rights to all content you submit, post or display on or through Chrome;

Looks like they're backtracking on this one too:

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/google-chrome-license-agreement/

So they do have that in some of their other EULA's? and they thought that it made sense there??

decibel.places's picture

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I just spent a *few hours* "troubleshooting" php/mysql code that writes a word doc to the filesystem (in Drupal) -

in Chrome, the doc would display properly as an echoed html doc, but the word doc was missing the right column below the first cell (left and right column of the table are drawn from different db tables)

Finally I had the *bright* idea to run the code in Ffox (where I originally developed the code), which produced the word doc properly

Doh!

?!

demonhale's picture

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Joined: May 2005

I think we need to watch out for more catch-it from Chrome... But I agree it's pretty fast... Won't trade my FF at the moment though...

Bompa's picture

He has: 64 posts

Joined: Oct 2003

Chrome, I just don't get why folks would use it. I mean most people
online think MSIE is the only browser in existence. LOL

Me, I don't use anything Google, but maybe that's due to my line of
work; the seo bootcamp.

later,
Bompa

He has: 1,758 posts

Joined: Jul 2002

Bompa wrote:
Chrome, I just don't get why folks would use it. I mean most people online think MSIE is the only browser in existence. LOL

Google have two of the top three most visited sites in the WORLD (Google.com #2, Youtube.com #3 according to Alexa). All it takes is for them push Chrome on those two properties for a couple of days and they can up their install base hugely (they're all ready pushing the beta on Google.com - they could make that ad much bigger if they wanted).

I wouldn't be at all surprised if Chrome overtakes Safari and Opera within a couple of months and start making headway towards taking out Firefox before long as well.

In all honesty, I don't care if it does, because it'll make Mozilla, Opera and Apple work harder to compete and hopefully take a chunk out of the IE6 install base as well.

Well... we can dream can't we?

Andy

They have: 1 posts

Joined: Sep 2008

Isn't all services exept AdWrods and Google the search engine in the so called "beta" modus?

I tought the main reason for this is because everyone know that "Beta" means "Everything is your responsibility" Sticking out tongue

fantastvik's picture

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Joined: Sep 2008

thats scary! i shifted to chrome after using FF for almost two years. i am shifting back to my good old FF. i hope that is safe? is there this thing with FF also?

decibel.places's picture

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Odd html email rendering problem in Chrome

Attached, same email viewed in Yahoo Mail in Chrome (breaks up) and Opera 9.52

Interestingly (?) the Chrome "full message" view was fine

I had a weird problem with Opera 9.5x in Vista Home Premium (b4 the Chrome release...) - when Opera is in a folder named "Opera" it crashes on Yahoo Mail (supposedly fixed in 9.52) but rename the folder to Opera952 for example and it is fine (?)

Also, since installing Chrome, Firefox3 has been acting funny, it freezes (mostly when system goes to sleep and comes back) and need to close firefox.exe AND end the process in task manager -

Anybody else notice any problems since installing Chrome?

(BTW Vista Print is very cool, I designed my own business cards and got return address labels AND a tshirt with my theme... their HTML emails are often entertaining, pssst - that's where I got my monkey!)

They have: 1 posts

Joined: Oct 2009

When I first used Google Chrome my first thought was, Wow, this is as fast as opera! And they copied some of operas features. For example, typing a sentence like, "I like dogs," into the Url box and then pressing enter. It then forwards to a (Usually Google, but not exclusively with opera) search engine; note that I'm not talking about the box in the upper right that many browsers have, but in the url box itself to save space. Also, Chrome's starting point looks an awfully lot like Opera's speed dial. There are other similarities, I'm sure. All in all, though, I haven't seen Chrome produce anything that Opera doesn't have other than some possible privacy issues.
They're just ripping off Opera, like how Explorer, Safari, and Firefox did with tabbed browsing.
Another issue I've ran into with Chrome is downloading stuff. When I download stuff with Firefox and it loses it's connection(it should be noted here that some Addons allow firefox to resume downloading), I can actually resume the download Firefox started with Opera. I haven't been able to do this with resume downloads with chrome or resume the downloads I started in Chrome with Opera.
I'd be interested in seeing if any of the Addons in firefox allow the resuming of incomplete Chrome downloads. I'll try and test this later when I have more time if nobody else has.
I'd hate to see a possible Open Source Champion like Google purposefully not be compatible with others; even if such an act is simply marketing.

-matt

santox's picture

They have: 5 posts

Joined: Mar 2010

Thank God I'm not the only one Smiling. My problem is nothing great but just that, one day I open my Chrome and what i see is all my installed extensions got uninstalled automatically.. I have no idea what the hell happened to it..

They have: 17 posts

Joined: Mar 2010

I am using google chrome since its beginning and its working fine for me. I don't have any issue with it. I am a big fan of google because it is providing quality services absolutely free.

They have: 33 posts

Joined: Apr 2010

SO what do you expect from a browser that is launched just to keep increasing the access to users' information (previously Google Toolbar did the same). I believe that chrome's main purpose wasnt to provide best experience. I use Opera and I love it for its user friendliness (just press Ctrl + Z and closed page is opened, for example).

In order to be the only business in the world, they are trying to compete everywhere. This is the reason Verizon is seeing Google as compatitor by ending the Verizon Nexus 1 agreement.

They have: 36 posts

Joined: Apr 2010

I am using Google Chrome since its beginning and its working fine and i have no problem from it
{links removed}

They have: 17 posts

Joined: Mar 2010

At begining, google chrome contained some issue. That's why, whenever google launch some new product, they launch their beta version. But after more than one year, I think google chrome is now much more stable as compared to internet explorer and the issues mentioned in above post no longer exists

They have: 111 posts

Joined: Aug 2010

i love to use Google chrome but it dont allow some plug in to install, so that i cant use them for my professional work...

Spielmann's picture

They have: 43 posts

Joined: Dec 2010

Google Chrome rules Laughing out loud

They have: 2 posts

Joined: Feb 2011

I love ff and chrome

..

They have: 219 posts

Joined: Sep 2010

Hi, i am using google chrome from past 2 years, i don't have an issue with google but that's true i heard google receive every single data accessed from google chrome

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