Google Wave?

[weem]

Thanks for posting that fransisca, I just want to try and clear this up because my name is involved here.

It's too bad you feel your security or privacy was violated in some way, but here is my take on the situation...

You are using Google Wave.

The email was a notification that someone added you to a Wave (consider those to be like threads in a forum). They are allowing you to see and participate in a conversation - that is all. In order to be added, someone had to 1) know your email address or 2) have you in their gmail contact list.

If you have a Google Wave account, you are willingly participating in a system of which one of the key features is the ability to add your friends/contacts to any Waves you make. I created an EN World Wave so that all the users from the EN World Wave group could find it and test out Wave there. I opened up access to anyone there (I didn't even invite one person, I simply made it "public" so that if you went to it via a link, you would see it in your list of waves).

Your call to Morrus to state he does not officially support it goes a bit far I think (though he is more than welcome to do so should he want to). Again, these Waves are simply like threads in a forum. This one was labeled "Welcome EN World Members and Guests" as it was linked to from the Google Wave user group here at EN World. It was a place for us all to go to from here to experiment with Google Wave and know that you had come to the right place.

I was able to, within a few minutes, find your email address here on EN World - not even in your profile, but as posted by you publicly in a forum thread. Someone who knows you here, who is also playing with Google Wave could have added you to that Wave thinking you might be interesting in checking it out - i don't know.

It may be a shock to be suddenly added to something you are not familiar with - but I will say again, whoever added you to the Wave knew your email address and added you because (more than likely) they thought you would like to check it out, and not out of some malicious intent or spamming effort.

My suggestion is to kill your Google Wave activities/account etc if this is something that is jarring to you because, well, it's how the system works and one of the reasons many people like it.

Thanks again for the information.

I hope that clears it up for you, and I do apologize for any confusion or frustration you've had


<edit> I do want to add, since there was talk of Russ clarifying which things are not official EN World business and since my name is involved here, that I am not officially attached to EN World in any way. I am not a moderator, or anything at all beyond a normal member like most others here. Anything I do related to EN World (be it Wallpapers or Waves) is done unofficially. </edit>

 

[Henry]

Google has made some very recent security blunders. They flubbed Google Buzz's contact info security initially, and it wouldn't surprise me if they pulled the same kind of lax security with Google Wave. Bugs the heck out of me, especially in this day and age of info fraud, that they would default to "opt in" on ANYTHING, rather than "opt out."

 

[Mark]

Hiya, Rich!

If you have a Google Wave account, you are willingly participating in a system of which one of the key features is the ability to add your friends/contacts to any Waves you make. I created an EN World Wave so that all the users from the EN World Wave group could find it and test out Wave there. I opened up access to anyone there (I didn't even invite one person, I simply made it "public" so that if you went to it via a link, you would see it in your list of waves).

I just got the chance to check this all out. I see from the Wave that you do have a googlewave.com email set up and that you were added to the EN Worlder wave begun by weem but I do not see you in the group set up here on EN World. A number of people who joined the group here and requested to be a part were added by me and some people who asked me for an invite and wanted to be included were added by me but you do not appear to fall into either category so I cannot imagine having added you myself. However, as weem partially points out, if you got a googlewave email and were part of someone's address book, or checked out any other wave, someone could have invited/added you into the EN Worlder wave without asking you. I'd say just "unfollow" it.

Personally, until they allow Wave starters to have more control over who can join, add, follow, and edit a wave, I am a bit leary of putting too much effort into using the system. Plus it got very cumbersome for a while though I'd imagine it has sped up since fewer people continued to use it.

 

[Nifft]

I am not officially attached to EN World in any way. I am not a moderator, or anything at all beyond a normal member like most others here.

That's not true at all. You're clearly a SILVER member, which is much better than being a normal member, but not quite as cool as being an electrum member.

"... or a Baatorian Greensteel Moderator", -- N

 

[mgbeach]

Google has made some very recent security blunders. They flubbed Google Buzz's contact info security initially, and it wouldn't surprise me if they pulled the same kind of lax security with Google Wave. Bugs the heck out of me, especially in this day and age of info fraud, that they would default to "opt in" on ANYTHING, rather than "opt out."

Now if you go into Settings from gmail there is a Buzz tab and at the bottom you can turn it off entirely and get rid of the Google Profile at the same time.