I use firefox, and have the NoScript addon installed. I was looking at the scripts a lot of sites were using and one was google-analytics.com
I did some snooping, and research and found it monitors my usage of the web. that is spyware and i despise it.
I don't know why everyone blames google for spyware. Most browsers can be set to block spyware. I use IE7 and Firefox. Both have excellent spyware blockers and phishing blockers. I can set both to block whatever web site I want. None of this is googles fault. It's up to you to provide blockers. I can even stop adware. I don't see the issue. Google is just a search engine. I think it is the best one around.
Google is an excellent reliable site/ search engine. The company is just amazing and the services are fantastic. No wonder it is being the #1 search engine. As all great things it has a few flaws and that would be the advertisements that without WOT telling you it is safe could not actually be safe.
Good search engine, but does leave cookies(which can be deleted by going to tools/options/privacy/clear now/ and select cookies). Google generally blocks pornography, unless you remove the filter.