Interesting article in the New York Times on Google’s Live Query, which displays real-time search requests from around the world. The result is a worldwide stream of collective consciousness.
Postcards From Planet Google
Buried on the second page of the article is this mention of the darker side of Google—it knows who you are:
Searches are logged by time of day, originating I.P. address (information that can be used to link searches to a specific computer), and the sites on which the user clicked. People tell things to search engines that they would never talk about publicly – Viagra, pregnancy scares, fraud, face lifts. What is interesting in the aggregate can be seem an invasion of privacy if narrowed to an individual.
For a peek at Google stats, see Google Zeitgeist