The way I look at google with their private information is that sure, they controll it but atleast we get to take advantage of it and you can turn of most of it if you want. The browser sync was what made me stay on chrome for as long as I did because I liked having my history synced between my desktop, laptop, school computer and phone.
They track your location, but atleast you can see that history at
https://maps.google.com/locationhistory/b/0. They read through your email but they also categorise it and, atleast in some cases help you find usefull information in there for google now (I have seen examples of it finding information about your flights or packages).
And all (that we know) they really do with the data in the end is give you targeted ads, and I prefer seing ads about multicopters because I have searched a lot for them than seeing ads about shampoo because someone a lot of people are really interested in beautiful hair. It is a bit scary but at the moment, I trust google with the data.
Say ONE stupid thing and it ends up as a forum signature forever. - Neuro Fuzzy