Google Analytics & Blogs
Category: Navel Gazing...
Posted Friday, November 18, 2005 at 09:46 AM [GMT-6]

I learned about Google Analytics from Jim's post over at Serotoninrain, and popped over to check it out. It seems like an interesting thing to have, although I've already got similar capabilities via SiteMeter and BlogFlux. But I decided to walk through the sign-up process anyway, just to see what was involved.

Everything was pretty straightforward and then I came to Google's User Agreement, which contains the following provision:

7. PRIVACY . You will not (and will not allow any third party to) use the Service to track or collect personally identifiable information of Internet users, nor will You (or will You allow any third party to) associate any data gathered from Your website(s) (or such third parties' website(s)) with any personally identifying information from any source as part of Your use (or such third parties' use) of the Service. You will have and abide by an appropriate privacy policy and will comply with all applicable laws relating to the collection of information from visitors to Your websites. You must post a privacy policy and that policy must provide notice of your use of a cookie that collects anonymous traffic data.

I wonder how many bloggers will actually read this provision, let alone create and post a privacy policy for their websites? Also, the requirement to "comply with all applicable laws relating to the collection of information" implies a heavier responsibility than one might initially think. Do you know the privacy laws in your state? I don't know anything about privacy laws in Texas.

Is this a big deal? Well, possibly. This is a legally enforceable agreement, although I don't believe Google is going to scan through the sites of all the subscribers for violations.

For me, for now, I'm going to pass. Life's complicated enough as it is. And I probably don't need another pie chart to -- as Jim so eloquently puts it -- tell me about the vast magnitude of visitors I'm not getting.

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Comments

Funny you should highlight that particular statement. And what does it say about me that when I first read it I thought, "I wonder what Eric would think of this."

I had to read through it a few times to get the gist of it. You've probably noticed that I haven't posted a privacy policy on my blog, though I have been thinking about doing so. Whether or not I keep the google code in my template is a whole 'nother question as it's still not working.

My thought about that item is that its a holdover from the period when the tool was not free and was primarily intended for commercial websites. Such a stipulation would seem to be in order in that situation.

It would seem to be unnecessary for your average blog. It makes me wonder why it's still there... although perhaps it's another sign that Google really fumbled the large scale launch of this tool.

Posted by: Jim at November 18, 2005 01:46 PM

...was primarily intended for commercial websites.

If a blog has even one AdWord ad (or any other flavor of ad), it's hard to argue that it's not a "commercial website." A good lawyer could make short work of that argument.

I'd be pretty surprised if a paragraph like this got left in the user agreement unintentionally.

Posted by: Eric at November 18, 2005 03:06 PM
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