100,000 Disconnect’ers

On December 20, 2010

DisconnectSometime today, Disconnect and Facebook Disconnect combined got their 100,000th active user on Chrome. Disconnect was released exactly one week ago and had 25,170 users as of yesterday. Facebook Disconnect was released exactly two months ago and had 74,417 users.

That the extensions, with no viral features, marketing, or PR (I just gave TechCrunch an exclusive preview of Disconnect), are now being run by 100,000 people each week is a clear message to Facebook, Google, and every other Internet company that they can’t take our data without our permission anymore.

Letters to the Editor

Ammy_769 said...

Congratulations! Nice addon and really really like your efforts, if you don`t mind, can you tell me from where I can check about change logs of addon.

Brian Kennish said...

Thank you. The change log is at http://code.google.com/p/byoogle/source/list (or http://j.mp/dchange, for short).

biomat said...

Dear Brian. Thanks for you efforts. Can we install this add-on in explorer/mozilla web browser also.. Or can you guide a similar add-on..
Thanks again

Nonsocial said...

YES, finally a social media/networking program that is useful...

Leo Fish said...

cool thank you! this is really great - i hope to be a paying customer in the future

Jonathan Agoot said...

I appreciate your two extensions Brian! Chrome runs faster with Disconnect + Facebook Disconnect installed, especially when loading up TechCrunch (it takes forevarrrrrr).

Jeevan said...

Any plans for a Firefox version?

Brian Kennish said...

Not yet. Check out Adblock (Plus) for IE and Firefox — there are multiple versions for each browser, but some assembly is required to use as a privacy tool.

Disconnect for Firefox will be available early next year.

Brian Kennish said...

Yes. ETA: February. You can sign up at http://disconnectere.com/ to get notified.

Brian Kennish said...

Thanks, TechCrunch has gone pretty overboard with how many social widgets their pages are loaded up with. :-P

eric z said...

Fyi - and for readers who have not seen reporting, a Google of your name, and/or your name plus "disconnect," returns hits reporting the addon and your work, on at least two news outlet sites, one being a CNN-Tech post dated Dec. 24, 2010. This excerpt [between the dotted lines]:

.......................................
Brian Kennish worked at Google for seven years, managing teams of engineers on a variety of products such as the Chrome browser and the moribund Google Wave.
Advertisement

Near the end of his stint at Google, Kennish developed a browser extension for Chrome called Facebook Disconnect.

The software blocks websites that have Facebook widgets installed from automatically sending information about the user back to the social networking company. Facebook Disconnect has 75,000 users, Kennish said.

"No one at Google asked me to do it," Kennish told CNN this week.
......................................

Now that you are a celebrity, how do I get an autographed baseball glove, etc.?

sugamari said...

I have a suggestion and you are just the guy to make it happen. I am a big fan of truth in the fight versus evil. I figure the free world(or the last vestiges anyways) could use an addon or app that allows him/her to block entire domains. For instance, news sites that charge for content or that lie and abuse their journalistic title. I am angry at Rupert Murdoch for both. I would like an unfriend button that marks links and alerts me to sites I don't want to see(no shortage of those). It would work for porn(if you got kids) and trolls(youtube comments) as well as lying truth deniers. We could call it the Troll Killer App. I would pay like crazy for that kind of functionality. I figure if it became available it would do more for truth and freedom than anything on the internet. I mean, they are getting away with way too much these days and you can't even comment to them half the time.

RazerMamba said...

Can you develop a version for firefox?

Sean Kearns said...

Hello Brian,

I installed Disconnect a few days ago and I'm shocked--and frustrated--by the numbers that pop up next the "d" icon.

For those of us with a low level of browser knowledge, I hope you'll address two questions in your blog or newsletter: (1) how is disconnect different than "incognito" or private browsing? And (2) how is disconnect different than blocking cookies in the browser setting?

Thank you for creating Disconnect!

Sean
Scottsdale, AZ

danieru said...

Hi Brian, great extension, thanks! Can you point me to some good blogs or articles that give more on what information exactly these third parties are taking, and how your extension is blocking this? Thanks again!

MrGamma said...

Wow, this is very interesting. While I can't say that I agree 100%, I also cannot believe that aggregate information is entirely harmless.

Wojtek said...

Hi,
any plans for extension like that for Opera? I know that it's extension system is still in rather nescent form, but it's there and I think it's a bit similar to Chrome approach (:

Brian Kennish said...

LOL, insane and awesome.

Brian Kennish said...

Yep, see below.

JBAlaska said...

Just subscribed to the newsletter, great job on this very useful add-on and I'll be jumping on it as soon as you release a FireFox version!

Guest said...

It's March and no Firefox version... :((

Brian Kennish said...

Only a month late! (Now I know why the marketing folks at Google never let us give dates ;-) — porting to Firefox was harder and the tax on my time of non-coding tasks, higher than expected.)

The Firefox version of Disconnect is code complete and will be out *soon*. If you email me, though, I’ll send you a copy right away — in exchange for your feedback :-).

KamakshiSri said...

Thanks, Brian. Will soon ask for a copy of it from you, the moment I am back top my hometown. These days I am on vacation.

Cristian said...

Awsome extension. Would it be possible to add a "inform your friends on fb/tw/g+ that XYZ installed disconnect.me" feature as part of the installation process or as an independent button that I can click on your website and does the informing part automatically?

Thank you,
Cristian