Google is surely the new Microsoft, writing software of the geeks, by the geeks, for the geeks, and clueless about poor Joe user.

One of the great advances in convenience this past couple of years has been the Bookmarks on Google toolbar. Instead of all your bookmarks being locked in on one piece of hardware, they are now online. You sign in to your Google account from any PC, and there they are on the Google toolbar.

So far, so good. Well, I’ve been having virus problems–actually “ad-ware,” I think. Shortly after opening up Firefox or Internet Explorer, ads for cheap air fares, porn sites, and (unkindest cut of all) anti-virus software would keep popping up.

I updated my security suite and ran all the programs. I jiggled security settings on my browsers to max. I tried a couple other things I found on the web. Problem diminished, but not by much.

Wanting to get on with some work, and not at the moment inclined to spend $150 plus two hours on the phone with an online clean-up service, it occurred to me to just try a browser I haven’t used before. So I downloaded Chrome, Google’s own browser.

That worked fine. Short learning curve, no more unwanted pop-ups. But … no Google toolbar! I have to re-create all my darn bookmarks; and they’re stuck here on my PC, so if I use Chrome on another one, I’ll have to re-re-create them. (Though since the ad-ware virus is presumably on my machine, I guess I can revert to IE or Firefox elsewhere.)

How dumb is that–to have a handy proprietory feature like online bookmarks, then not include it in your proprietory browser?

Anyone like to sign on to my petition to have all MS and Google project managers rounded up and shipped to Kodiak Island to be hunted with dogs?