Google's innovations are popular and effective. So why does the company find it so hard to pronounce them finished? It turns out that “Don't Do Evil” isn't quite holy enough. Following on from last month's security worries over Google Desktop Search, this week sees a curious flaw surface in Gmail, Google's must-have email system. Why worry? It's not a big problem: small amounts of other people's email surfaces at random if you type just the wrong thing. It's fixed now. And anyway, both products are in beta. You knew the risks when you signed up. Google is taking the art of the public beta to new levels. Its popular Google News service was launched in beta form over two years ago: it's still there. Even Microsoft at its most paranoid has never left a release candidate of a product out in limbo for that long -- perhaps the Googleplex could do with some dull old project managers to leaven the visionaries.
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