Networks and Cloud Computing

Cosmic Trends author Philip Brown writes that the last time Jupiter was in Aquarius, in 1997, Google was launched. I still remember how silly it sounded, and how everyone laughed at it. Now, Google is a tech leader, and on the verge of launching GDrive, a cloud computing system that makes info stored on personal pcs accesible from anywhere. Here's the explanation from Google in a press statement: The applications people use every day, such as email, photo sharing, and word processing, are moving to the web because it's easier to share and access your data from anywhere when it's online, in one place. Jupiter in Aquarius brings the weather, air, technology and the virtual environment all together -- this cloud computing will surely take off this year.

The networks are consolidating, like one big virtual brain, and even though Google says it's secure, encrypted and all that, the privacy-lover in me sees red flags. It reminds me of when I left Facebook, after seeing an ad for lonely hearts on my page -- this was after I switched my status from married to single (that's my business after all). And then friends sent sympathy emails, asking what had happened! I'm still married, but just didn't want to network with other married people. And even though I've left, as this article on Facebook and surveillance makes clear, it's like Hotel California... you can checkout, but you can never leave. All your pictures, thoughts, moods, messages and political alliances are forever the collected data and property of Facebook....to infinity. I'm a protective Cancer on this, and will forgo the hundreds of "friends" in favor of a little piece of mind.

A new generation is not as hung up on privacy, and Jupiter in Aquarius will keep the social networks ever expanding. With Jupiter in a sign of friends, collective efforts, having a global reach, the contacts made can open doors, especially with career. It's a tool that brings people together, and that's a good thing. The surveillance aspect is just something to be aware of, in this era when the 'corporate computer' seems to know a whole lot about us, and real privacy is something that has to be actively sought, rather than expected.

• Philip Brown on Jupiter in Aquarius, 2009