Saturday, July 5, 2008

California Law Requires Linking to Privacy Policy from Home Google bows to pressure, adds 'Privacy' link to home page. For Google, ready Privacy: That could be the subliminal message Google wants to send by replacing its name in the homepage footer. [Latest from Computerworld Last month, privacy organizations wrote to Google CEO Eric Schmidt asking the company to link to its privacy policy from its home page. Including the link on the home page is good practice -- and also mandated by California law, the organizations said. On Thursday, Google acceded to the request, putting the word "Privacy" at the foot of its home page and linking it to its privacy information pages. The link replaces the company's name next to the copyright notice, leaving the number of words on the home page unchanged. I don't think laws should address homepage content as specific as links to privacy policies, or to public records request process (for State Departments and Agencies). Page Contents and placements are in the domain of information architecture, user experience design and usability not legislation. I'm actually relieved that Google.com stays famously uncluttered. I joke that some of my colleagues would put 3 or 4 paragraphs explaining what you can type in the Google search box and add a paragraph about Google's history. 5:27:47 PM    comment []

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