Google Docs can now be exported from the Google Takeout menu, thanks to Google’s Data Liberation Front. Previously, users could export and import documents in various formats, but they are now available alongside data from all other Google services in Takeout.
Google Takeout was unveiled in summer 2011. It allows Google users to export all their Google data to disk or just data from individual services. It’s all thanks to the Data Liberation Front team, which builds tools to give Google users control over their data.
“If you lock your users in, it makes you complacent,” Google’s Brian Fitzpatrick said at OSCON last summer. Contrast Google’s per-product liberation with Facebook’s feeble efforts at data portability. You can’t even really delete a Facebook account; you can only suspend it. Google’s Data Liberation Front makes user data portable back and forth between Google services and standard file types on the user’s computer.
While Google Docs already had its own export option, its inclusion in Google Takeout is an important step. Takeout is the only place users have to go to get their information out of Google. Google’s business is built around gathering data from its free services, but the Data Liberation Front lives up to its promise to give users final control. Especially for Docs, which has all kinds of applications for work and other sensitive uses, inclusion in Google Takeout is a great step for users.
Liberate your data at google.com/takeout.
Have you ever used Google Takeout to export your data?
