I have noticed that both Google and Yahoo! are allowing users to save their searches. I was wondering what was everyone's opinion on the matter? Do you think it's a good thing or bad? Also what possible side effects do you think can occur?

Sounds nice, but also it could be somewhat incriminating I think that searches are sort of saved anyway. If the page is cached, you should be able to go back to it. If you saved a search and then a site moves for some reason, it might show up there, but not if you perform a fresh search maybe. It's an interesting thought.

Never used this function. Not even sure if it's really usefull in my opinion. However maybe someone needs it, so it's good for them

It could be useful, like if you search for something you want, and later you want to search for it again but can't remember the exact words you used. Or, perhaps if you need to access a previous search you did from a different computer.
Of course, the privacy issues are huge, personally I wouldn't trust anyone with everything I've ever searched for, etc (I have no real need for it anyway).

Heh, I actually have only started to use this a week ago with my Google/Gmail Account. I thought it would be handy, but I have not yet made use of this function. It's kinda creepy how Google would know what links I clicked on in my search...

Privacy is a pretty big problem. When I search for bad stuff on Google, I usually would log out first if I remember.

Well Google knew what links you clicked on in your search before this new function... I agree it is kinda creepy...

In google too bar, they save what you search too. But you can always delete it. And you can alway delete the google cookies file.