Youtube just let me upload a huge video. It took more than 4 hours because my upload speed maxes out at about 15 kb/s. When it was finally done, it said "oh, sorry, your video is too long. BUT you can keep it anyway if you just give us your phone number."
Now, leaving aside the fact that the site knew how big the file would be before allowing me to spend 4 hours uploading it, because there's clearly nothing I can do about this trap to get people to waste their time and then feel obligated to provide personal information so it wasn't wasted after all, should I give them my phone number? This is Google we're talking about. (Ah, remember the days before Google owned everything and we were all "yay Google!"...)
On the one hand, they already know just about everything about me. There's no real getting around that. I use Gmail, I used to use Google Docs (and now my new job is switching everything in the company over to Google as well), I use Chrome for some things. But my phone number... That's always been something I don't connect to the internet in any way, shape, or form. I've always known that anyone who has my number actually knows me. If I give it to Google...
I tried using a free online SMS service but it didn't work. Apparently Google can tell what kind of phone service it's sending to and requires a real-life phone.
Has anyone else "verified" their Youtube/Google accounts with a phone number? Is it okay to do this? Did you start getting calls from telemarketers? What are they going to do with my number? I don't even see any privacy policy on the phone verification page to vaguely reassure me that they won't be selling my info...