There is a character on Dilbert called Mordac. If you’ve seen him, you know he is a caricature of an unfortunately real person in many corporate organizations who worries solely about data security at the expense of usability, accessibility and just about anything else:

We all hate Mordac. Of course, on a logical level, most of us know that we need him (or her). When it comes to sharing data online, most people behave with more risk than they probably should. As the places to share your personal data have grown, so too have the ways that you can accidentally share too much. The problem is, it is sometimes tough to spot those moments when you are sharing too much without meaning to. As each of us starts to live more of our lives and place more of our identities online, knowing the do’s and don’ts of sharing personal information online will be increasingly important. Here are a few lessons I’ve learned and follow about what I share online:

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Google is a master of innovation in the search space and while they seem to subscribe to Guy Kawasaki’s “release early and release often” new product philosophy, the attention to changing the Google search page is near-holy. Minuscule design changes at even the pixel level are cautious and carefully considered. And rare.

Apparently, Google is testing a redesign and logo which you can see in this home page screen shot:

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Last year I consulted with a local TV affiliate that wanted to build a localized social network. Part of the plan was to equip citizen journalists so that they could record and upload videos of news stories relevant to their town or county.

We would have killed for the new YouTube Direct tool just launched by Google.

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OpenX has long been angling for Google’s online ad dominance. And after a new multi-year deal with Microsoft, announced this morning, they’ll have an even bigger ally in the fight. The partnership has been in trials for over a year, but is now official.

Explains TechCrunch:

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Are you a member of a Facebook Group or an adminstrator of a Faceboobook Group? Then you are going to see some dramatic changes when you take a look at your Group this week (did you know there are currently over 45 million Facebook Groups?).

Until now, Group activities have been isolated to the group page. This week Facebook have made changes to Facebook Groups – changes are being rolled out across all groups over this week if you don’t see the changes yet.

In summary:

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