Mountain View, California-based Internet giant Google has made changes to its  popular Google Reader news and blog Web reading application adding greater control over how information is shared among online friends. The new controls addressed privacy concerns leveled at Google after its decision in December to automatically distribute all of a person's shared Really Simple Syndication (RSS) items in Google Reader with each of their Google contacts. Shared Items Sent To All Contacts No Longer The Rule Prior to the update Google announced Tuesday, Google Reader users who chose to share a news or blog item had to share it with all of their contacts amassed from Google's Web e-mail application Gmail and its chat program Google Talk, making it impossible to send a favorite item to select contacts from within the program.  Google Reader users can now maintain a separate list of friends within the program, and choose which ones a shared item should be sent to. This change and several others were announced Tuesday by Google Reader team member Dolapo Falola in a message posted on the company's Google Reader blog. Falola said that Google Reader users "can now manage a Friends list within Reader, separate from your Gmail chat contacts," making for a system offering a "more flexible way to let you choose who to share with." When Google Reader first launched in October 2005 as a test service under the experimental Google Labs program, sharing news or blog finds with friends involved manually sending them a link to a specific Web site. Changes Prompted By User Complaints In May 2006 Google released a version of the news aggregator for mobile devices, and in January of this year launched a special incarnation tailored for Apple's iPhone.  Some Google Reader users were upset after Google started sending out their shared items to everybody in their Gmail and Google Talk contact lists, which could until recently include casual acquaintances added automatically by Google. Before the changes announced Tuesday, all such contacts would see the shared items of friends within Google Reader. Complaints from users prompted the move to a separate Google Reader contact list management system, Falola said. "We heard you loud and clear. You want more control over your sharing," Falola wrote Tuesday in announcing the improvements. While Some May Be Excluded, All Shared Items Still Public Google Reader users also gained the ability to chose whether they want to follow the shared items from a Reader user that has included them in their shared friend list. "When someone decides to share with you, you will get a notification and the ability to preview and subscribe to their shared items. At that time, you can also choose to share your items with them (or not)," Google said of the new additions. The new system for controlling sharing within Google Reader replaced a temporary solution implemented by Google following suggestions from users. That system involved using tags, categories and folders to keep news and blog items separated, however with the new system Google aimed to make sharing more flexible. Users of Google Reader will encounter a message asking them to "Customize your friend list," Google said, which can be turned off by clicking the "Edit" button and then selecting "Cancel," at least until Google implements a new method to notify users of the changes announced Tuesday. "We apologize for the inconvenience and are working on making this more obvious and less intrusive," Google said of the notification messages. Google Relaxes RSS Feed Reader Friend Sharing Rules Some users had worried that they would be forced to add contacts into the new Google Reader system in order to continue using the application, however Google said that "you will never be forced to share items via Reader." Even with the sharing controls added Tuesday, anyone -- not just Google Reader contacts -- can still read those items marked as shared in the application, through visiting a public Web page automatically created for each list of shared items, a practice likely to draw the ire of privacy advocates. Before the new features were added to Google Reader, a group of rival firms with similar services led by FriendFeed offered separate contact lists and other features, including some not yet offered by Google Reader, such as the ability to add comments on shared news or blog items. The changes Google has brought to its Reader program are likely to be only the first in a series of updates as the company seeks to make its various Web services more like social networking sites. Related Links:
| 
