I use to participate on this forum all the time and I loved it – I was always highlighting Google-rific things like Search-Bugs, Beta Invites, new google initiatives and other google related technologies, theories on Google. It was all public and all REALLY fun!!! It was a race to get the new discovery on http://blogoscoped.com before anyone else ;) I really haven't done anything for awhile because I started my ecommerce site – http://www.Openyard.com. It's been my experience so far that dealing with Google from a business perspective is way different than when I was just hack'in around. In the past years, I've had guys from the Google Analytics team call me and ask me particular features I'd like to see. Essentially – Google deals with 1000^2's of businesses, 1-on-1, in a very private way and most of the time I think it's the businesses best interest to keep it private. I'm curious how many Blogoscopers out their believe they share a 'special' relationship with google.

For example – What if an investment company starts getting a special report on http://finance.google.com that they find particularly valuable. Are they going to blog about it?

What if I'm accessing a particular Ecommerce Analytic report or particular statistics about my competitors websites. Am I going to blog about? What are the pro's and con's of releasing the information to the public?

I believe there's definitely a potential to be a lot more tools out their and the reason they aren't being blogged about is because they give their users more value being private than public.

SOO.. Essentially – Google could be playing a game of disinformation where they continue to track the which users let out what information and thus allowing them to see what tools are truly valuable to users because they are slowest ones to be discovered. As Google continues to gather more and more information, they are also growing in their ability to decide who gets it and when.

So – here's more direct question. Has there ever been a time when you've come accross a New Google feature that you believed was valuable enough to you that you didn't publicize it? It took me a while to talk about the new filtering functions on Google Finance site.

Yes.

Yes!? Come on Jim. Can't you at least hint at it?

The lack of comments on this issue almost seems to prove my point.. OR disprove it ;) Regardless, I still think it's interesting.

Justin, speaking for myself I need to try my best to avoid "secret Google business channels" for conflict of interest free reporting. For instance, the AdSense team once contacted me, as webmaster of gamesforthebrain.com, for a special prototypical ad optimization program for gamesforthebrain (which uses AdSense). I told them that they can give me information if they want but that I cannot keep anything they tell me private or sign any non-disclosures, because I need to report for this blog. I never heard of them afterwards...

Justin:
Think about Google's trusted testers. Each one could start a blog and report the new features months or years before they're released. The blog could be anonymous (a la MiniMicrosoft). Of course, there's always the risk that someone catches you, but I'm sure someone could do it.

Philipp – It's pretty interesting that they didn't contact you anymore.
Alex, I think it would be pretty easy them to know who leaks what information into the internet based on basic searching. Just as Philipp is always scanning the web for anyone who mentions anything about Google, Google would be scanning the web for anything that mentions anything about any initiative. So even if the blog would be anonymous, finding information on the web the initiative would prove someone is leaking.

Say if someone signed a nondisclosure agreement, they broke it. If they used Gmail to leak information, do you think they would find out?

Ben: I'm not a lawyer but in a legal point-of-view, it would make sense to bring a copyright infringement suit against the "anonymous" to reveal the root of the source.

This is off topic, but can you sue the 'anonymous' until the anonymous is revealed? For example, Google vs. Jane Doe?