Your Google docs: Soon in search results?

Users of Google Docs and Spreadsheets accustomed to publicly publishing their documents might want to rethink exactly how publicly available they want to them to be.

Google on Thursday wrote in a blog post that "in about two weeks, we will be launching a change for published docs. The change will allow published docs that are linked to from a public Web site to be crawled and indexed, which means they can appear in search results you see on Google.com and other search engines...This is a very exciting change, as your published docs linked to from public Web sites will reach a much wider audience of people."

"Marie" of Google was quick to note that the crawling for search results "only applies to docs which you explicitly publish using the 'Publish as Web page' or 'Publish/embed' option, and which are linked to from a publicly crawled Web page" (documents for which users choose only to "allow anyone with the link to view" will not get crawled, she wrote, adding that users can unpublish documents they wish to remain uncrawled).

Some users of the search giant's suite of online productivity applications expressed concerns about the plan, suggesting better labeling of potentially crawlable documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. For example, how would you know definitively if a publicly crawled Web page has linked to your published document? Is the only way to ensure that your published document does not ultimately show up in search results to actually unpublish it?

As noted by The Register, "Google Apps master view does not tell you which docs are publicly published and which aren't." While it may well be obvious to most users how publicly available their Google documents are--and many of those published documents may well be intended to be as publicly available as possible--this seems to be another area where Google needs to find the right balance between transparency and data accessibility.

[galadan111]

google sucks.

[Rezca]

Would you care to clarify? For one thing, you never mentioned why you think Google "sucks". You never gave any evidence, your opinion, personal experience or any other bit of info except for those two words. As it stands, it appears you are merely trolling for personal entertainment. At least jaguar717 gave his/her valid opinion on the matter,

[dowell100]

Google sucks because they are a powerful, rich, self-serving company that is seeking to recast the law to meet their own Utopian ideals. Nothing has proven that more than the fact that the Department of Justice has called them to task for the Google Books deal. Google cares nothing for the intellectual rights of others, not do they care, as in this case, for individual privacy rights. They have betrayed trust.<br /><br />In making Docs available, Google will be violating the privacy of many by making heretofore private documents public. They have not made their dashboard clear so there is no question what is public and private and they have given inadequate notice of the change. Rather than just a blog entry, Google should be emailing individual Docs users repeatedly for 6 months in advance advising them of the massive upcoming change to the status of their documents.<br /><br />@Rezca, it would seem YOU are the one who is trolling by suggesting that people need a reason why Google sucks. While I have supplied 2 excellent reasons (there are many more), many people (like galadan111) who understand intuitively that Google sucks, and believe as I do, that Google is run by bad people with bad motives.

[M128SF]

"by suggesting that people need a reason why Google sucks."<br /><br />...yes, of course, why not say something sucks without an actual reason. I'm sure that's not pretty much trolling in its most common form at all, whereas suggesting you need a reason for hating something, of course, is trolling in its purest form.<br /><br />But whatever. It won't matter after, as many seem to believe, the world has been taken over by a evil company owning a search engine and a couple of tech/web-related projects.

[smrterthnu]

Google's great! I wish they would just start indexing my hard drive so I could easily find all my files in their search engine anywhere in the world. That would be awesome!

[slice77]

The ONLY problem that anyone should have with this is there is no way to see which Docs YOU made public in the past. The only documents that Google will make available in search results are those that users explicitly made public. You should only have a problem with this if you forgot which docs you made public, in which case you make the ones in question private again.<br />And another thing, why is everyone up in arms over the Google books deal?! NOTHING IS STOPPING ANY OTHER COMPANY FROM DOING THE EXACT SAME AS GOOGLE IN THE FUTURE! You can't resell the scans that Google paid to have done without giving Google some money first. Totally understandable (they did the work). If you want to sell the digital copy of the book w/o giving Google money, then you have to scan it yourself! They only made the deal to protect the digital copies that they produced!<br />Google has done amazing things for the internet, giving away free products left and right and making information that would otherwise be hard to access just a click away. Yeah, they advertise, but thats their business model. Don't charge, sell ads instead.

[unknown unknown]

@dowell100 <br />"Google sucks because they are a powerful, rich, self-serving company that is seeking to recast the law to meet their own Utopian ideals." <br /> <br />I don't know how utopian they are, but if those are the critera for sucking then all the companies on the fortune 500 list suck as well. <br /> <br />"Nothing has proven that more than the fact that the Department of Justice has called them to task for the Google Books deal. " <br /> <br />The DOJ's primary concern with the settle are the anti-trust implications as it would give Google the sole rights make out of print books avaliable online. Considering the way Google Books worked when the publisher filed suit Google probably could have made a pretty strong fair use claim. <br /> <br />"Google cares nothing for the intellectual rights of others" <br /> <br />Those rights are not aboslute despite what some rights holders would like to think. There are fair uses, that do not require compensation or permission. <br /> <br />"not do they care, as in this case, for individual privacy rights. They have betrayed trust" <br /> <br />Examples? Also no one is forced to use Google and they certainly seem to have a better record when it comes to handing over data. They were the only company that fought the U.S governments request for millions of search queries and they've kept servers with users sensitive data out of repressive regimes like China so authories can't easily use the information. <br /> <br />"In making Docs available, Google will be violating the privacy of many by making heretofore private documents public." <br /> <br />Only if they are published and linked to on a public website. Publishing a Google Doc requires explicit action by the user. Indeed, when you click publish you are given an explaination of what it means and asked if you want to continue. One would hope people who use Google Doc would not publish a document they wanted kept private. <br />By selecting an already published document, you can unpublish it. <br /> <br />"They have not made their dashboard clear so there is no question what is public and private and they have given "inadequate notice of the change." <br /> <br />All documents default to unpublished and unshared, private. Only publishing makes a document public. Sharing lets let only people you specify have access and you can further define what sort of access they have. So while the published status is not clear it is not an egregious violation. <br /> <br />"Rather than just a blog entry, Google should be emailing individual Docs users repeatedly for 6 months in advance advising them of the massive upcoming change to the status of their documents." <br /> <br />6 months and repeated email is excessive. There will be no status change to their documents. <br /> <br /> <br />"@Rezca, it would seem YOU are the one who is trolling by suggesting that people need a reason why Google sucks." <br /> <br />No he's right, just saying something sucks with no explaination is trollish and lazy.

[dowell100]

@ unknown unknown <br /><br />It's always nice to hear from the Google Legal Department. Don't forget to bill your client for this contribution.

[Random_Walk]

"Google sucks because they are a powerful, rich..."<br /><br />...and you're not. Otherwise, I doubt you'd give a damn. ;)

[OfficerNelson]

@dowell100<br /><br />I think you misunderstand. Google is indexing published web pages. Is this particularly wrong?<br /><br />Here's how one would have to get their spreadsheet (or whatever) published:<br />1.) Hit Share.<br />2.) Click "Publish as a web page".<br />3.) Click "Start Publishing".<br />Does ANY part of this process seem private to you?

[linuxroadwarrior]

Dubunking the anti - Google statements:<br /><br />1. " Google sucks because they are a powerful, rich, self-serving company....."<br />You have forgotten about Microsoft and the BSA. Google is not evil, cruel and selfserving.<br />Dowell100, Once again you have been found wrong. You have not supplied valid reasons.<br />The goal of Google Books was to make info widely available. It seems to me that your goal is to make Google look bad.<br />2. "they tried with Gmail by indexing and advertising against your email..." <br />And you think Micro$oft doesn't index your email? Advertising: Text is better than graphic. I hate the ads in Hotmail. The ads in Gmail have proved helpful in some situations.<br />3."Translation: Don't trust Google w/ anything important..."<br />You are wrong there. Is there any proven reason? No.<br /><br />Microsoft is the one in hot water. Their Office Word infringes on i4i Technologies' patents.<br />And if you happen to be a MicroDroid, tough. You'll be out of a job real quick.<br />Ambulance chasers, you too will be out of a job.

[jaguar717]

"Is the only way to ensure that your published document does not ultimately show up in search results to actually unpublish it?"<br /><br />That's like asking "is the only way to ensure people don't see you in your yard to actually go back in the house?"<br /><br />You have to go out of your way to make something public, yet we'll still be hearing people whine about the fact that now the stuff you make public might be seen by the public! The horror!

[Khurt]

You are so right. The ignorant often confuse anonymous with private. Thanks to Google, their anonymous public documents are now no longer anonymous.

[markosph]

good point jaguar717

[El_Gringo_Guapo]

Translation: Don't trust Google w/ anything important

[norcalrivercat]

Too late... for everyone

[screamapillar]

Um, no you are incorrect. The translation is 'if you make it public, it will soon be truly public'. They are not suggesting for even a moment that any document you haven't gone out of your way to make public and then link to on a public site (so two significant steps in a system that defaults to everything private even if you share it) will be public. <br /> <br />This is something that many people have wanted - that when they have a public, published document it is searchable. This actually assists in intellectual property and copyright claims - as in, when a document is accessible to the public, it automatically has a level of protection under these forms of legislations in most jurisdictions. It will cut down on the theft of original material that wasn't considered 'published'. <br /> <br />If you don't want your documents public, then don't go through the arduous process of making the document public nor the second step of having it linked from a public site. Seriously - what is it about public you don't understand? Being upset about this, is like advertising a gig on a street poster and then getting pissy when someone puts a light above it and lists the gig on a website so others can actually notice it. It was ALREADY public, it is now searchable and visible but still as public as it was 2 minutes ago...

[richard993]

You can only guess what Google will do next... they always try to sneak your privacy out the door with almost everything they do... they tried with Gmail by indexing and advertising against your email, they tried with Google Books by violating authors rights, they tried with Chrome in their earlier privacy policy which gave them rights to everything you typed in the address bar (the backlash forced them to change it)... and they tried again with Google Docs and this time with justification. All they have to do now is flick the options so that all your documents are public by default and not tell you, and your privacy is now violated without breaking the law.<br />What's more dangerous than some company violating your privacy? a company that knows how to violate your privacy within the current legal framework and get away with it. Imagine how dangerous Google would be if you trusted them with Cloud computing and provided them with your sales data! Google will know what products or services you offer and what the demographics are of your customers who buy these products, then use this information as leverage to sell more ads. Don't laugh, it's most likely already in the pipeline.<br />I totally agree with the earlier comment. It's hard to trust Google with anything that is important to you, your business, or your customers.

[eltoro2827]

Why would I use google for anything?

[t8]

Yeah when you can use Alta Vista for search.

[eltoro2827]

@t8....sorry dude...alta vista is great but i use infoseek. *sarcasm*

[Philstera]

Another instance of Google trying to take over the world, when will these guys STOP!!!! <br /> <br />Next they will want to index record and display my public phone calls made on Android, how about any document i create using CHROME OS will that become publicly available too? <br /> <br />The more I hear of google the more I distrust them. Bing has come along just in time to provide some competition to these guys little did I know that it has only made Google ramp up their efforts of monetising everybodies privacy even faster and more blatantly. Google is out of control!

[Khurt]

Publishing is the process of production and dissemination of literature or information - the activity of making information available for public view.<br /><br />http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&#38;client=safari&#38;rls=en&#38;defl=en&#38;q=define:publish&#38;ei=hyO2SsrvLcqE8QbnwYWzAw&#38;sa=X&#38;oi=glossary_definition&#38;ct=title

[screamapillar]

Totally out of control - Oh the humanity, making public, published documents, public published documents! Wow, sounds like such a violation!! <br /> <br />Hey I want my public published documents to be hidden!! <br /> <br />/end sarcasm

[ralfthedog]

This is no different than a Microsoft Word or Excel document. If you put a Word document on the web, It might get indexed. <br /><br />If you don't want your documents indexed:<br /><br />1. Don't check the "publish this document" box. That is the same as saying, "This is for everyone to read."<br /><br />2. Don't put it on a public website. That is also the same as saying, "This is for everyone to read."

[Chameleon81]

I dont see nothing wrong. You can still share it with your friends without being crawled. A " do not index" option for webpages would be good though.

[n3td3v]

All your documents are belong to the interwebs, let's see what private info gets out and how much of a disaster this move is for Google and anyone using "the service" who finds their stuff in search results.

[ralfthedog]

Is this any different than any other service? My company has two policies. We don't use third party hosted applications for confidential data and we don't publish confidential data on public (or private) websites. <br /><br />If you don't want your 2009 taxes public, don't publish them on the web.<br /><br />If you must publish documents on the public web that you don't want anyone to see, put a robots.txt file in the directory.

[kojacked]

The only issue I see here is that people are generally dumb and lazy. Take the folks who install P2P software on their work computer and end up making plans of military vehilcles available for all to see. <br /> <br />I sure hope Google (and Zoho, and Microsoft) makes it a little difficult to accidentally publish to the web. For example say I want to share a document with a friend. I hope the steps I have to go through to share the document to that friend is much easier and obvious than the steps required to publish the document to the web. If it's easier to publish the document for all to see then I can see some people taking the quickest path without understanding the consequences.

[screamapillar]

Agreed. As it stands at the moment, many content publishes actually complain it is too hard to publish/make the document public. Because even the 'public' option is not 'published' AND 'public'. For it to be crawlable, it will need to be public, published AND linked from a public and already crawlable web page. In addition, google docs informs you of the implications of publishing a document. <br /> <br />I think this demonstrates reasonable steps have already been taken, however, in the list view of the documents I think it would useful to display which are public vs private and in addition, which are crawlable, vs just public.

[BIGELLOW]

The number of comments complaining that Google will be crawling and index publicly available and published documents is a testament to how many people have no clue what they're doing.<br /><br />It takes a number of mouse clicks and selections to actually make a document public. Why would anyone do this unless they actually wanted it public? Further more, it takes additional steps to link to this document from a public website. If they really wanted this document to be private, why go to such great lengths to make it publicly accessible?<br /><br />The only mistake Google made was not indexing these from the very start. Then there wouldn't be a "controversy".

[screamapillar]

Agreed Bigfellow - the number of paranoid dillusions posted here are bordering on hilarious, and I'm one that always errs on a path of caution but I see no real threat to anyone with this 'change' that simply means your advertisement in the yellow pages is now also in the index page.

[smrterthnu]

If only Apple had a search engine! It would be the sweetest, coolest search engine EVER!

[unknown unknown]

And Steve Jobs and company would have to approve every site in the index.

[sp33dyf33t]

I have a feeling Apple's controlling nature would cause some issues. I think they should stick to operating systems. It's what they do best.

[t8]

If you publish something, it normally means that you want to get it out to people.<br />So what is the problem.<br /><br />If you don't want it public, then share it.<br /><br />Publishing anything is what it is.

[knowles2]

The problem is google has become to successful an now everyone jealous and crying like babies about it. Trying to find the slightest fault with what ever they do. <br />It jealousy at worst an can turn the brightest people into stupid idiots. <br />They apply the same thing to stuff which is good for the world and it people such as the google book project.

[t8]

Agreed.<br /><br />People are jelous of success.<br /><br />I can understand hate toward Microsoft as they have hurt consumers with their tactic, but Google has been great. They give much of their great services away, and they have singlehandly made the Web a much better platform by not only providing the best search, but paying web site owners revenue through Adsense, hence encouraging better web sites.<br /><br />Thanks Google.

[alan_06]

Thanks for reminding existance of Google Docs!

[BillHudson007]

Sounds perfectly ok to me, and a great service. If you publish it publicly it would be pretty silly to not want it seen. <br /> <br />Good job Google on the "right balance between transparency and data accessibility."

[designppl]

This is really fantastic......as now we got one more way to come in Google search...... <br /> <br />chris( http://www.designerpeople.com)

[247mark]

The ugly side of "cloud computing" starting to show...

[popcorn_master]

Ok...<br />1. The Internet is not private. (for the most part)<br />2. In spite of popular opinion... Privacy is NOT a right, it's a privlege.<br />3. Google's primary purpose is to provide search capabilities making <br />it easier to find data. They provide other services, but if you are a simple<br />clicker and don't read what it is that "click" means or don't understand<br />what it is you are agreeing to then don't complain when the responsibility<br />falls squarely on YOU.

[Homncruse]

Yikes... I don't get the controversy. Notice that the word is *published*! Not *shared*. Let's make a simple analogy here using non-digital forms of the word:<br /><br />I write a book/article/document/whatever, and I:<br /><br />1) want to *SHARE* it with a friend or two. I print a copy for each of them and hand it off. The document is now shared. Can they then photocopy it and send it to their friends? Sure, but if the document is intended for their eyes only, I entrust them to keep their integrity.<br /><br />2) intend it for mass consumption by the public. I send the document to a *PUBLISHER* for mass printing and distribution. They send it to bookstores et. al. and I become a super mega billionaire because I just wrote the best book in the history of the entire universe and employ today's richest people as my household servicefolk (hey, it's my story). Do I get upset that the *PUBLISHER* released my book, instead of printing off a few copies for myself and my friends? What else do you expect when you PUBLISH a document?