Sunrise at Beaver Ridge

Thank God Google.com made sure to make special logos for occasions such as 'Beaver 6' day. Lord knows, were it not for their crack team of artists, I'd probably have forgotten about it altogether. I'll be sure to produce running commentary on this phenomenon as it develops.

In the meantime, don't be fooled: Google wants your soul.

How do I know this? Frankly, I don't. But the advent of GoogleEarth makes me a bit wary, to say the least, that one day I won't go ahead and find my social security number posted at the top of a search result for my name. I have had more than a few unsettling incidents when I've typed in names of people I know, only to have the first listing come up as their name, address and phone number. Is that public information? Yes. But, typically, it's public by default. For instance, poor Abdis, look at these guys - what the hey did they know about this being available online? Probably not a whole lot.

It's no secret that Google is in a race with other prominent online information conduits to become the sole or dominant provider of all online information. Books are not the only thing, but multimedia and anything else you can really think of - they're trying to put online.

And that's not a bad thing, completely. It is a worldwide search engine that allows access to information around the world and that's not something to be taken lightly in its ability to equalize the playing field. Anyone with a dial-up and enough hard drive is going to be able access and store as much information as they can deal with. Although, I'm not expecting impoverished rural children in the DRC to utilize their ability to access free Mark Twain novels all of a sudden.

I guess I'm not so worried that Google wants my soul as much as the fact that the people who would want my soul have access to Google. Incidentally, I tried to open a wormhole to another dimension by typing 'Google' into the search field at Google.com. Much to my dismay, the wormhole led back instantly to the exact spot I was sitting just before entering it and closed just before I could see the path through which I'd just traveled. Additionally, I was covered in ice and smelled like gym socks. Never again, Google.