New Delhi: After Google announced its plans to launch new product-endorsement ads incorporating photos, comments and names of its users, Google+ users adopted a unique approach to protest the move. A few users changed their Google+ profile pictures to images of Google's executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, reports Huffington Post. It means if a Google+ user publicly endorses a particular brand or product by clicking on the +1 button, Eric Schmidt's image will appear in that particular ad.
The changes, which Google announced in a revised terms of service policy, set the stage for Google to introduce "shared endorsements" ads on its sites as well as millions of other websites that are part of Google's display advertising network.
The new types of ads would use personal information of the members of Google+, the social network launched by the company in 2011.
Reviews and ratings of restaurants or music that Google+ users share on other Google services, such as in the Google Play online store, would also become fair game for advertisers.
Users under 18 will be exempt from the ads and Google+ users will have the ability to opt out. But Marc Rotenberg, the director of online privacy group EPIC, said, users "shouldn't have to go back and restore their privacy defaults every time Google makes a change."
Google's latest terms of service change will go live on November 11. The ads are similar to the social ads on Facebook, which has 1.15 billion users.
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