Do you have a very common name like I do?  Share your name with a celebrity?  Not thrilled with how you show up in searches?  You might like to know about the big G’s most recently publicized feature.

Google has introduced an upgraded version of Profiles, which give people who have shared information with the search behemoth more control over how they appear in the search results.

As I am sure you are aware, Google returns the 10 most relevant results on its first page when you perform a search.  Now, there is an 11th result returned at the bottom of the page when someone searches for a particular name.

You need to have a Google account to create a Profile, and you decide how little or how much information it contains.  They can include a photo, description, your location, links to your accounts on social networking sites, contact info and more.  You can also designate a custom URL for your profile.

Some have suggested this is Google’s attempt at “killing” Facebook.  I don’t think that’s quite the case–yet.  But it will be interesting to see what else they have got up their sleeves.

Whenever something of this nature is discussed, ultimately talk turns to the issue of privacy.  Certainly you can keep your profile private if you do not want it showing up in search.  Some people will no doubt choose to do so, feeling there is already too much information available out there as it is.

I’d love to hear your feelings on this.  Do you have a Google Profile?  Do you plan to create one if you don’t have one already?  Does it creep you out? 🙂  Let me know in the comments.

Photo Credit: Danny Sullivan