If you read my original post, my problem was that the sidewiki was activated without any action on my part. And yes, I accept Google’s terms for toolbar when I download it, but it does not mean that they can add entirely new products on my browser without my permission.

FYI, the Google sidewiki team acknowledged that what I reported should not happen, and are looking into this.

First of all, Google does not need your permission to add a feature to the toolbar.

Second, you accept the agreement of the toolbar when you download it.

Third, the Sidewiki will not take any space unless you activate it , and you could enable or disable the notification bar.

Fouth, you may go to Toolbar setting, choose options and the unchech the Sidewiki.

Thanks

http://onlineraga.blogspot.com/2009/11/assumptions.html

Well said!

Hijacking 404 pages is the hallmark of malware. The alexa toolbar did this pissing me off. I am surprised that Google would do it. Plain greed I guess, the 404 pot is worth about $1B/year.

Makes me remember why I had originally installed it in the first place years ago – it was to solve one simple thing – I wanted GMAIL to pop when I clicked on email links (instead of Outlook) when I was using FF. As simplistic as that sounds, that was my only reason.

I’ve grown to use one other feature, which was to login to my Google Account, right from the toolbar. So I guess that makes 2 use cases.

But you’re right about the “drive by” installs…and there seems to be a technical matter as well – at least on Windows.

FF runs much slower with more of these additional options turned on. On certain instances, the FF process doesn’t terminate properly (even if you close the browser, the process is still running). So aside from doing the requisite Task Manager shutdown procedure, I’ve been able to get rid of this simply by turning off more of the features (and getting back to my original GMAIL and Google Account login use cases).

And finally, a pet peeve – it interferes with my auto-complete username/password logins. I know it sound like making things more secure, but hey, I’m in IT and can decide which sites I use this FF feature on (Remember Login). To get it back, disable the add on altogether.

So while I can probably live with all the new features, one thing it should not do is interfere, modify and render useless the host/program its running on in these ways (wow, I’d never thought I’d equate a Google product with “parasite” but that sentence sounds like it). Or if that was the intent all along, then offer ways, tips on how to do that.

Thanks for your insight. Good day.