Google Latitude, it's too close dude!

Google Latitude - yet another privacy-intruding Google Map feature - starts its operation today.

It can be used on your mobile or your computer to locate someone. Yea, someone - your friend, family, colleagues, or rivals - who  opted in to Latitude.

A great tool for control freaks heh?

Google team said, "So now you can do things like see if your spouse is stucked in traffic on the way home, notice that a buddy is in town for the weekend, or take comfort in knowing that a loved one's flight landed safely, despite bad weather."

Which means you are not able to tell your boss you are stucked in traffic while you are still brushing your teeth at home. Which means you can't say "Sorry dear, I'm in a meeting" while you are busy partying with your friends. Which meansYOU ARE UNDER SURVEILLANCE.

Come on, there's nothing wrong to be honest to your wife and be responsible to your job.

Come on! Everyone needs a break! Telling a small or white lie isn't so bad right? Sometimes, it's not about being truthful or not. It's about "Oh please!STOP BUGGING ON ME!"

Uneasiness.

So for each person, you can choose to share your best available location or your city-level location, or you can hide. Everything is under your control.

People always lose control when they overestimate their control force and underestimate the anti-force.  Imagine yourself telling your girlfriend, "sorry but I can't share my location with you." I dare not imagine what will come next. Prepare to get in a quarrel debating how much you love her. 

Or, when your boss asks you to switch on the Latitude so that he can increase effeciency (the actual reason is to make sure you are not having a coffee in Starbucks at 3.30pm) would you ever dare to say NO? No.

So yea, you areNOT IN CONTROL.  

Ah ha, another fun function here."For instance, let's say you are in Rome. Instead of having your approximate location detected and shared automatically, you can manually set your location for elsewhere — perhaps a visit to Niagara Falls ."

Now I don't understand the usage of Latitude.

Oh one last thing. You are able to hide yourself from another user, but not from Google. Will they ever pass on the information to the government like how they dealt with Chinese Government regarding the cyber dissidents?

I'm too insignificant to worry about this issue la. Anwar, take care lo.