It's definitely an interesting strategy, but I think it relies on two parts that other companies aren't currently following which require real changes to how they operate, not <i>just</i> better PR:<p>1. Use the data for something other than solely advertising or analytics, which meaningfully improves the service in some non-trivial way. (Some other companies do this, e.g. people are quite happy to give OkCupid as much personal information as it wants, if they feel it'll improve matches.)<p>2. Give you enough control over your data that people feel more comfortable giving it in the first place. With Google, there are places where you can <i>delete</i> it; for example, if you let Google track your physical location in Latitude, you can not only opt out again later, but you can even retroactively delete all the location data that was ever collected. Most companies don't want to allow that. Facebook, for example, famously provides no way for you to actually delete your profile, in the sense of it really being deleted from Facebook's servers.<p>Besides deleting it, Google also tries to make you feel like it's "your" data in the sense that you can export it, via its "Data Liberation Front" initiative that has no real counterpart in other data-intensive companies.
Even worse, in the UK they've managed to trick the generally trusted national charity Citizens Advice Bureau into endorsing their "Our cookies are for your convenience!" claptrap. The CAB is featured prominently on their marketing all over.<p><a href="http://www.google.co.uk/goodtoknow/" rel="nofollow">http://www.google.co.uk/goodtoknow/</a>
<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/google/8827809/Google-teams-up-with-Citizens-Advice-Bureau.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/google/8827809/Google-...</a>
Funnily enough NoScript throws a clickjacking warning on <a href="http://www.google.com/goodtoknow/online-safety/" rel="nofollow">http://www.google.com/goodtoknow/online-safety/</a> when I try to play the video.
Especially concerning privacy, these cartoons remind me of the Qatar censorship page:<p><a href="http://i.imgur.com/MfKOJ.jpg" rel="nofollow">http://i.imgur.com/MfKOJ.jpg</a><p>They are trying to make something nefarious look fun. I mean, it's great that the barista down the street knows that like cream with my coffee, but I wouldn't want her to know <i>everything</i> about me. So why would people feel comfortable allowing a distant corporation to "get to know them"?