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I find it incredibly convenient not to have to log into drive, gmail, maps, youtube, etc. separately. They all work seamlessly together, and I know I sound like a shill for saying so, but I've had nothing but positive experiences with it.

Same, except for Youtube.

I see the convenience, but that only works if you're willing to bare your soul to Google. If you want to have one identity for YouTube, a different identity for Gmail, and don't want Google to know where you are via Maps, that becomes much more problematic.

I wouldn't quite say I've "bared my soul to Google". I slowly signed up for those services as they became available and now I only have to login to one of them to use them all. If I don't want Google to know about me for something I just open an incognito tab.

If you have multiple google accounts like the gmail website in a browser on a PC, you can switch between them by just choosing the account from the google accounts menu. Tremendously convenient. Google can have my figurative "soul" for this.

Comparatively if I have to switch between my twitter accounts, it's way more convoluted than it needs to be on a PC/browser. Still, it used to be much much worse when going to their login page gave you a redirect to their app download page. It used to take me ages to locate a workaround.

Sounds like a good opportunity for a browser that manages your various identities across multiple sites.

Chrome has had this feature for years. You can create separate Profiles for YouTube, Gmail, etc. I do this with Facebook to minimize exposure to the Like Button virus.

How do you access this feature?

The 'People' section in Settings. There's also a button with your profile name on it at the top right in newer versions of Chrome.

Is there any way to stop this automatically picking up who I am when I log into GMail in the browser? I don't want Chromium picking up my identity just because I logged in once.

I wish they would just get it right, and let me create different accounts for the apps I want to use. I just want a YouTube account. No Gmail. No G+. No tying my adwords account to anything else unless I request it.

This is extremely simple, and Google has made this horribly invasive and it's flat out broken at this point.

But we all know why they forced the unification of these accounts. So they can correlate our activity across services to "better serve us". (Read: serve us ads.)

Even if that is the goal (which is likely), it does not explain the need to force me to create accounts for applications I don't want, like Gmail. That's like going to a car dealership, buying a sedan and the dealership forces you to take five crates of crab apples with you at gunpoint.

It is more like a car dealership putting their dealership license-plate holder and the car make/model sticker on the back. And the crappy non-replaceable Navi system.

It's broken for me because I uploaded copyrighted clips to YouTube in 2006 with a username. When Google took over and linked my Gmail to YouTube and got serious about copyright, they banned me. So I have the pleasure of being able, as they seem to intend, to use one Google account to navigate all their services, except for one of the most popular because of petty offenses done in the early years of social media.

Create a second Profile in your browser.

Right. And this will bake your brain... Your "old YouTube" account is probably already a "Google Account".

A "Google Account" is the same as your gmail account, which is likely the same as your Youtube account. This was true before Google+ came along.

Honestly, the whole account "integration" just pisses me off. I want my Gmail account to be separated from my Youtube account and from the Maps account.

The main reason (by far) Google unified them is so they they can more easily track everyone across multiple properties.

That is an understandable choice, which Google should respect and enable.

For many others (self included), the account integration is a killer feature.

One account? Well three or four actually. Was hard to just have one with multiple work accounts and private ones.

> This is confusing to me. What IS a "Google Account"? Is it my gmail? That makes no sense to me, it's an email service. A "Google Account" sounds like I work at Google. If you were to tell me I had a "Google Account", I would assume it's Google+.

It is a gmail account. Every time you are prompted to enter your google account, what do you enter? Yup, it was that simple.

> It is a gmail account.

You're completely incorrect. You see how this actually is confusing!

A 'Google Account' is just a login that allows you to use a Google product. You can sign up with your own email address if you like. Go and try it:

https://accounts.google.com/SignUpWithoutGmail

Wow, what the, I stand corrected.

> > It is a gmail account.

> You're completely incorrect. You see how this actually is confusing!

This is historically inaccurate. I have never signed up for a Google Account and yet I have one.

Before Google+ and Google Apps existed as concepts, people had GMail accounts. Then along came other Google Apps, and GMail accounts were upgraded to Google Accounts which could do more than just GMail.

Fast forward a few years, and Google+ comes along, and confused the hell out of this even further.

Hmm, not sure exactly what you're saying but if it's that Gmail accounts came first and then the ability to have accounts without Gmail then you're incorrect.

Google had products that required accounts way before Gmail came along. Adwords started in 2000 and I think Google Groups started in 2001. I'm pretty sure I personally remember having an account for Google Groups before Gmail even existed, but I could be wrong.

I'm also certain I had a blogger account with Google back in 2003 sometime and Gmail didn't come along until 2004 for an April Fools day joke I think.

> You can sign up with your own email address if you like.

Yep, but you can't move from Gmail back to your own email address any more.