Why hate the NSA when you already give Google everything?

The title above is mostly devil's advocate, but I like to think I raise a good point.  Yes, yes, we're all very upset that the NSA is sucking up all our metadata and some of our content; yet at the same time, a majority of us are just giving it away to Google like nobody's business.  Now, don't get me wrong, I love Google as a company, their products are pretty great and I think they do good stuff for lots of people.  However, I find it to be an interesting disconnect where the only difference between people’s reactions to the two organization is one of them asked nicely for most of their life’s information, and one of them just took it secretly anyway.

There’s obviously a few more differences than that, but that’s sortof what it comes down to in a way.  I find that the main difference with Google is that they just SEEM like a nice company.  They’ve always been Good Guy Google:

They give you free email, voip, video chat, cloud storage, knockoff Microsoft office programs, the list goes on.  All they ask is that they be allowed to record every single thing you do on all those services and use it to target ads toward you.  Now, most people don’t really mind this.  “So you’re saying I get to use this awesome thing you made for free, and all you’re gonna do with my end of the deal is sell me things I’ll probably like?”  Doesn’t sound so bad, does it?

Well apparently problems have really started to gain some steam, because there has been a class-action lawsuit filed against Google for their scanning and interpreting of people’s private emails for the purposes of advertisements and marketing.  While no human actually reads any of your information, computers do, and understand what you're saying well enough to target ads to you.  Lots of people turn out not to be okay with this.   

One of Google’s major arguments basically boils down to “How on earth could you not know we were gathering and selling your information?  That’s literally the entire point of Google and something we publicly talk about all the time.”  Now, this is fair enough, but a fair point that other bring up is that Google will also scan any emails coming from a non-Gmail account going to a Gmail account, and they consider this a violation of their privacy, because they never agreed to Google’s right to do that.

Regardless, Google has asked for the case to be thrown out on the grounds that “all users of email must necessarily expect that their emails will be subject to automated processing,” which sortof brings me back to my point about the NSA.  Google collects the same kind of metadata that the NSA (supposedly) does.  They amass a database of that same scary information that can figure out where you are, when you’re there, how frequently you’re there then, and even has the cojones to make an app to help you out with your routine (that they know by heart now) so you can avoid traffic or something.  But that’s totally okay for a lot of people, and I’m sure almost all of the same people are quite unhappy that the NSA is doing essentially the same.  That’s why I think this actually boils down mostly to how we view these organizations.  Do you want this friendly, happy, shiny-new-toy-every-month company that gives you nice free stuff with reliable service?  Or do you want grumpy mean old big brother NSA stealing the same stuff while you’re not looking, and giving you nothing in return (except maybe taxes so they can afford to steal your stuff)? Hmm.