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I used to be a Google fan boy but am starting to dislike them more and more. This, they killed off reader and the creepy data collection they do is why I've sta

I used to be a Google fan boy but am starting to dislike them more and more. This, they killed off reader and the creepy data collection they do is why I've started to look into alternatives for their products - anyone have any good suggestions?

rootusrootus 8y ago
I feel the same way. I used to like most all of their offerings and I considered them [as a company] pretty benign. But over time I am less impressed by both their product offerings and their ethos.
jgtrosh 8y ago
There's a variety of “de-googlifying” services provided by https://www.framasoft.org https://www.framasoft.org you might be interested in
- bklaasen 8y ago
  Thanks for this. They've come up on my radar a few times. I'd love to hear from anyone here who uses these services.
codyb 8y ago
I use Fastmail (paid) for email with my domain name. It's alright, the app works well enough on iOS. No complaints so far really. Then DuckDuckGo for search. You can use !g to switch to google search but I rarely do anymore. Then Weblock and uBlock origin as ad blockers for phone and desktop respectively to prevent some data harvesting. And I only browse in incognito, I just log in everytime I need to use something. Then Apple Maps to replace maps. I do still have a gmail account so no quite totally off google. And Apple Maps has gotten a lot better over time but is undeniably the worse product of the two. But it works well enough.
- bogomipz 8y ago
  Could you say what does Weblock provide that uBlock doesn't? I looked at their FAQ and it wasn't obvious to me. Thanks.
jolmg 8y ago
Fastmail and DuckDuckGo is what I use. I've been meaning to install LineageOS on my phone, too. Anyone have suggestions of alternatives for YouTube? Would be cool to see a list of software and services organized by the Google product they're alternatives of.
- huntie 8y ago
  >alternative for YouTube If you mean the site you could use youtube-dl on desktop and NewPipe on Android. If you mean the service, I don't think there's anything. YouTube is pervasive for non-porn videos. Want to watch a talk from that conference last month? It's only on YouTube. Want to learn how to rebuild a V8? The best information is on YouTube. The only thing I know of that isn't on YouTube is gun videos, and only because Google banned their accounts.
  - rabidrat 8y ago
    Where should I post my video tutorials though? vimeo?
    - jsjohnst 8y ago
      If you don’t care about organic discovery and are just using it for hosting, yes, Vimeo is awesome.
      - GW150914 8y ago
        Youtube has the benefit of a huge audience, but organic discovery?! Come on. Unless you’re producing clickbait, appealing to tweens, crapping our memes, or pimping rage fuel, their algos will not put you up next. It’s almost comical how bad their recommendation engine is for discovery. Listen to a pop song? Doesn’t matter if it’s the only one you ever watched, now you’re being recmmmemded Ariana Grande until you die. At least that’s sort of comprehensible, but they also make weird connection too. Watch The Jimquisition, and because “games” you get gamergate and alt right trash. Watch a video on the moon landings, and because “moon” you get conspiracy theories. The algorithmic purpose seems to be, “hey you like X, maybe you’d like an insane or hateful tangent to X? Would that keep you clicking?” Organic my ass.
staplers 8y ago
ProtonMail has been the best (free) gmail alternative I can find. Has the necessary mobile apps and encrypts all email.
- randie63 8y ago
  I have used protonmail for a long time but have now switched to tutanora. The recent 100% rebuild of the webapp is really nice and fast. Android app is also 100% open source on fdroid
sfsylvester 8y ago
As others have commented, there is a variety of alternatives to Google for the majority of their products, and the discussion has been had on HN a number of times . [0]. What really annoys me is how woven Google has now become to our working day processes. It's all very well having open-source alternatives for private use, but many (I included) used Inbox for work where we are obligated to use Gmail. This feels like a step backwards in many regards. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558
- freehunter 8y ago
  I agree, it's mind boggling how Google managed to work their way into such major corporations and organizations. At a company I used to work for Google massively (massively) undercut Microsoft for Gmail and Google Docs vs O365. I guess like with Android, no one stopped to wonder why they're giving it away practically free?
  - jsjohnst 8y ago
    > no one stopped to wonder why they're giving it away practically free? Practically free!? Google Apps for domains is either $5 or $10+ a month per user, depending on feature set. That’s roughly the same price as most other commercial email providers. I don’t know for sure, but my guess is they make a profit on every account just on those monthly fees.
    - freehunter 8y ago
      Office 365 is literally double the price of Gmail, and full-blown Exchange is even more expensive. I wouldn't call double the price "roughly the same".
      - jsjohnst 8y ago
        It’s literally not double the price. Office 365 is $5-15 depending on edition (Business Essentials, Business, and Business Premier) and if you do an annual commitment. That’s the same price range as GSuite which is $5 to $25 depending on version (Basic, Business, Enterprise). Sources: https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-business-essentials https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-busine... https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-business https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-busine... https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-business-premium https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-busine... https://gsuite.google.com/pricing.html https://gsuite.google.com/pricing.html
cyberpip 8y ago
See https://restoreprivacy.com/google-alternatives/ https://restoreprivacy.com/google-alternatives/ for a good list.
foobarian 8y ago
I was a fan boy for a while due to the general Unix geekdom impedance match, and I disliked the Apple ecosystem due to being led by big-ego designers, but I still gotta admit, Apple's incentives are better aligned with the little people's (the end users') interest. In the case of Google the users are the advertisers and you get what you get. I see the decisions play out internally at the adtech company I work for, and it's really nothing sinister, but revenue has a huge influence on decisions and the end user often loses.
- JustSomeNobody 8y ago
  Looking at the prices for the new iPhones, I don’t know what little people you mean.
  - refoundglory 8y ago
    People who are not incorporated.
kilroy123 8y ago
I'm the same! I had the very first Android phone, the G1, and countless Android phones after that. I was a huge promoter when Android first came out. I pay for Gmail, Google drive, Google Fi, and use Google voice. - I've decided I'm going to switch back to FireFox. - I switch to an iPhone for the first time ever this year. - I've looked hard into switching to https://www.fastmail.com https://www.fastmail.com. I've gone as far as backing up all my emails. (Funnily enough, I was looking into switching to Inbox.) - I switched over to Dropbox. - I literally only talk to one person on hangouts now. - I primarily use Dialpad now. (from the makers of Uber Conference) - I've been using duckduckgo.com more and more. I tried it as a daily driver for a bit but eventually went back.
amaccuish 8y ago
They lost my trust with reader. The data collection stuff only confirmed it. I began to self-host my mail, and it's working out really well. I used SOGo, which does contacts and calendar too. For files I used Nextcloud. I use the Nextcloud News app as my reader. All authenticate to my home's LDAP servers, so same username and password, two-factor etc.
bklaasen 8y ago
You can do it bit by bit. Start by switching to Firefox on desktop and mobile (if you're an Android user). Install Firefox Multi-Account Containers to sandbox Google and other surveillance capitalism products. Switch to another provider for your email, contacts and calendars. I chose Fastmail - it's adequate. The best thing I can say about it is that it has a suite comparable to Google mail, calendar and contacts and there's no evidence it's tracking me. I use Thunderbird on the desktop and the Fastmail app on mobile. I've moved all my contacts into Fastmail. Use hooktube (and Hooktube Redirector) on desktop and mobile and NewPipe on mobile. Favour apps from F-Droid. Install uBlock Origin on desktop and mobile. My next moves are to get my calendars out of Google (my wife and I have several calendars we've shared for years) and into Fastmail. I need to get a couple of years' worth of photos out of Google Photos and back into Flickr. (They probably have a brighter future now that they've been rescued from oblivion by Smugmug - though Ipernity is probably another decent option for a classic Flickr experience.) `rclone` will probably be a lifesaver there. I need to find a solution for hosted files and docs; I've not found Nextcloud to be convincing. I use B2 for offsite backups. I've yet to install a pi-hole, though I already have a pi doing DHCP and name resolution for my home network. I often use sshuttle if I want to become opaque to my ISP. I have a PIA VPN account but it's consistently terrible - could be my ISP mucking with the traffic. It's going to be a multi-month project. I look at what I've done and have yet to do to evade constant casual surveillance and I strike myself as sounding like a tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist - but I'm not. I'm just a rational citizen, attempting to recover for myself some of the human rights I took for granted a decade ago.
- cmehdy 8y ago
  Thanks for sharing. I think I need to organize myself to be able to walk away from google and it's all-encompassing experience and grasp, and it's not always easy to make the first step.
mattkevan 8y ago
After being a keen Google user in the late 2000s to mid 2010s, I’ve been in on a process of extracting them from my life now their true creepy colours are on display. YouTube => Deleted Google plus => Deleted Gmail => Deleted, switched to Soverin [0], works great, less than $4 per month for 25gb email hosting Drive => Deleted, moved to iCloud Docs => Deleted, use iWork for docs and Bear [1] for text Search => Duck Duck Go, getting better all the time Chrome => Safari, excellent battery life, good tracking protection Google Photos => Deleted, moved to Apple photos Next project is to move my website off of Google Analytics. I’d love to fully switch to Apple Maps as it’s getting better but don’t know if I fully trust it yet. Google Maps is the gold standard. [0] https://www.soverin.net https://www.soverin.net [1] https://bear.app https://bear.app
- decasia 8y ago
  Soverin sounds like a good project. What do you make of the fact that the warrant canary hasn't been updated since May, though? https://soverin.net/warrant-canary https://soverin.net/warrant-canary
  - freehunter 8y ago
    Does Gmail even have a warrant canary? I don't think so, so comparing apples to apples it seems like a wash.
  - rrcaptain 8y ago
    That's a poorly phrased warrant canary. Aren't warrant canaries intended to be for FISA-type warrants?
  - ashelmire 8y ago
    Aren't warrant canaries valid until removed? Dates on them don't matter.
    - Buge 8y ago
      It says "Up to date as of: 2018-05-22". That seems to imply that it may have been invalidated at some later point. If it is valid until removed, then it shouldn't have a date at all.
wuschel 8y ago
Have a look at this HN thread called Alternatives to Google Products: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558
mbrumlow 8y ago
I was a fanboy too and feel the same. The things that rub me the most seem to be problems I think from the way the hire people. The average stay at google is like 2.5 years, so most of the things I loved were created by people who are no longer there ( I am sure there are some staples that stay there, but ... ) They tend to higher young and fresh out of school people who know algorithms but seem to lack a strong foundation in computer history. Not just normal computer history (the why things are the way they are) but they lack even the historical history with the products they are working on. You can see this in the way their products have changed and either lost features, or changed features in a fundamental way that break them. I think many of the problems created area also created from the altitude that "they are the best and brightest so whatever they think must be right". I know this generalization does not hold true in all cases. This sort of attitude can be seen most recently in the way they are handling "www" and "m" domains, and then even suggesting that they would somehow just make the change and then assume they could push a standard on the rest of the internet. There are other cases but don't have the time or will to detail every one of them. The google today is not the google many of us fell in love with.
- ardy42 8y ago
  > I think many of the problems created area also created from the altitude that "they are the best and brightest so whatever they think must be right". I know this generalization does not hold true in all cases. This sort of attitude can be seen most recently in the way they are handling "www" and "m" domains, and then even suggesting that they would somehow just make the change and then assume they could push a standard on the rest of the internet. There are other cases but don't have the time or will to detail every one of them. This. That attitude will also result in an almost total inability to take valid feedback. If you incorrectly and arrogantly think your the best and brightest, why would you listen to the plebs when they tell you you're making a mistake. Then you get the plebs who buy into the best and brightest myth. They falsely assume whatever decision Google, Apple, or Facebook makes must be backed by air-tight reasoning, understanding, and skill; then praise turds to the heavens out of ignorance.
  - mbrumlow 8y ago

rootusrootus 8y ago

I feel the same way. I used to like most all of their offerings and I considered them [as a company] pretty benign. But over time I am less impressed by both their product offerings and their ethos.

jgtrosh 8y ago

There's a variety of “de-googlifying” services provided by https://www.framasoft.org https://www.framasoft.org you might be interested in

bklaasen 8y ago
Thanks for this. They've come up on my radar a few times. I'd love to hear from anyone here who uses these services.

codyb 8y ago

I use Fastmail (paid) for email with my domain name. It's alright, the app works well enough on iOS. No complaints so far really. Then DuckDuckGo for search. You can use !g to switch to google search but I rarely do anymore. Then Weblock and uBlock origin as ad blockers for phone and desktop respectively to prevent some data harvesting. And I only browse in incognito, I just log in everytime I need to use something. Then Apple Maps to replace maps. I do still have a gmail account so no quite totally off google. And Apple Maps has gotten a lot better over time but is undeniably the worse product of the two. But it works well enough.

bogomipz 8y ago
Could you say what does Weblock provide that uBlock doesn't? I looked at their FAQ and it wasn't obvious to me. Thanks.

jolmg 8y ago

Fastmail and DuckDuckGo is what I use. I've been meaning to install LineageOS on my phone, too. Anyone have suggestions of alternatives for YouTube? Would be cool to see a list of software and services organized by the Google product they're alternatives of.

huntie 8y ago
>alternative for YouTube If you mean the site you could use youtube-dl on desktop and NewPipe on Android. If you mean the service, I don't think there's anything. YouTube is pervasive for non-porn videos. Want to watch a talk from that conference last month? It's only on YouTube. Want to learn how to rebuild a V8? The best information is on YouTube. The only thing I know of that isn't on YouTube is gun videos, and only because Google banned their accounts.
- rabidrat 8y ago
  Where should I post my video tutorials though? vimeo?
  - jsjohnst 8y ago
    If you don’t care about organic discovery and are just using it for hosting, yes, Vimeo is awesome.
    - GW150914 8y ago
      Youtube has the benefit of a huge audience, but organic discovery?! Come on. Unless you’re producing clickbait, appealing to tweens, crapping our memes, or pimping rage fuel, their algos will not put you up next. It’s almost comical how bad their recommendation engine is for discovery. Listen to a pop song? Doesn’t matter if it’s the only one you ever watched, now you’re being recmmmemded Ariana Grande until you die. At least that’s sort of comprehensible, but they also make weird connection too. Watch The Jimquisition, and because “games” you get gamergate and alt right trash. Watch a video on the moon landings, and because “moon” you get conspiracy theories. The algorithmic purpose seems to be, “hey you like X, maybe you’d like an insane or hateful tangent to X? Would that keep you clicking?” Organic my ass.

staplers 8y ago

ProtonMail has been the best (free) gmail alternative I can find. Has the necessary mobile apps and encrypts all email.

randie63 8y ago
I have used protonmail for a long time but have now switched to tutanora. The recent 100% rebuild of the webapp is really nice and fast. Android app is also 100% open source on fdroid

sfsylvester 8y ago

As others have commented, there is a variety of alternatives to Google for the majority of their products, and the discussion has been had on HN a number of times . [0]. What really annoys me is how woven Google has now become to our working day processes. It's all very well having open-source alternatives for private use, but many (I included) used Inbox for work where we are obligated to use Gmail. This feels like a step backwards in many regards. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558

freehunter 8y ago
I agree, it's mind boggling how Google managed to work their way into such major corporations and organizations. At a company I used to work for Google massively (massively) undercut Microsoft for Gmail and Google Docs vs O365. I guess like with Android, no one stopped to wonder why they're giving it away practically free?
- jsjohnst 8y ago
  > no one stopped to wonder why they're giving it away practically free? Practically free!? Google Apps for domains is either $5 or $10+ a month per user, depending on feature set. That’s roughly the same price as most other commercial email providers. I don’t know for sure, but my guess is they make a profit on every account just on those monthly fees.
  - freehunter 8y ago
    Office 365 is literally double the price of Gmail, and full-blown Exchange is even more expensive. I wouldn't call double the price "roughly the same".
    - jsjohnst 8y ago
      It’s literally not double the price. Office 365 is $5-15 depending on edition (Business Essentials, Business, and Business Premier) and if you do an annual commitment. That’s the same price range as GSuite which is $5 to $25 depending on version (Basic, Business, Enterprise). Sources: https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-business-essentials https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-busine... https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-business https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-busine... https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-business-premium https://products.office.com/en-us/business/office-365-busine... https://gsuite.google.com/pricing.html https://gsuite.google.com/pricing.html

cyberpip 8y ago

See https://restoreprivacy.com/google-alternatives/ https://restoreprivacy.com/google-alternatives/ for a good list.

foobarian 8y ago

I was a fan boy for a while due to the general Unix geekdom impedance match, and I disliked the Apple ecosystem due to being led by big-ego designers, but I still gotta admit, Apple's incentives are better aligned with the little people's (the end users') interest. In the case of Google the users are the advertisers and you get what you get. I see the decisions play out internally at the adtech company I work for, and it's really nothing sinister, but revenue has a huge influence on decisions and the end user often loses.

JustSomeNobody 8y ago
Looking at the prices for the new iPhones, I don’t know what little people you mean.
- refoundglory 8y ago
  People who are not incorporated.

kilroy123 8y ago

I'm the same! I had the very first Android phone, the G1, and countless Android phones after that. I was a huge promoter when Android first came out. I pay for Gmail, Google drive, Google Fi, and use Google voice. - I've decided I'm going to switch back to FireFox. - I switch to an iPhone for the first time ever this year. - I've looked hard into switching to https://www.fastmail.com https://www.fastmail.com. I've gone as far as backing up all my emails. (Funnily enough, I was looking into switching to Inbox.) - I switched over to Dropbox. - I literally only talk to one person on hangouts now. - I primarily use Dialpad now. (from the makers of Uber Conference) - I've been using duckduckgo.com more and more. I tried it as a daily driver for a bit but eventually went back.

amaccuish 8y ago

They lost my trust with reader. The data collection stuff only confirmed it. I began to self-host my mail, and it's working out really well. I used SOGo, which does contacts and calendar too. For files I used Nextcloud. I use the Nextcloud News app as my reader. All authenticate to my home's LDAP servers, so same username and password, two-factor etc.

bklaasen 8y ago

You can do it bit by bit. Start by switching to Firefox on desktop and mobile (if you're an Android user). Install Firefox Multi-Account Containers to sandbox Google and other surveillance capitalism products. Switch to another provider for your email, contacts and calendars. I chose Fastmail - it's adequate. The best thing I can say about it is that it has a suite comparable to Google mail, calendar and contacts and there's no evidence it's tracking me. I use Thunderbird on the desktop and the Fastmail app on mobile. I've moved all my contacts into Fastmail. Use hooktube (and Hooktube Redirector) on desktop and mobile and NewPipe on mobile. Favour apps from F-Droid. Install uBlock Origin on desktop and mobile. My next moves are to get my calendars out of Google (my wife and I have several calendars we've shared for years) and into Fastmail. I need to get a couple of years' worth of photos out of Google Photos and back into Flickr. (They probably have a brighter future now that they've been rescued from oblivion by Smugmug - though Ipernity is probably another decent option for a classic Flickr experience.) `rclone` will probably be a lifesaver there. I need to find a solution for hosted files and docs; I've not found Nextcloud to be convincing. I use B2 for offsite backups. I've yet to install a pi-hole, though I already have a pi doing DHCP and name resolution for my home network. I often use sshuttle if I want to become opaque to my ISP. I have a PIA VPN account but it's consistently terrible - could be my ISP mucking with the traffic. It's going to be a multi-month project. I look at what I've done and have yet to do to evade constant casual surveillance and I strike myself as sounding like a tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist - but I'm not. I'm just a rational citizen, attempting to recover for myself some of the human rights I took for granted a decade ago.

cmehdy 8y ago
Thanks for sharing. I think I need to organize myself to be able to walk away from google and it's all-encompassing experience and grasp, and it's not always easy to make the first step.

mattkevan 8y ago

After being a keen Google user in the late 2000s to mid 2010s, I’ve been in on a process of extracting them from my life now their true creepy colours are on display. YouTube => Deleted Google plus => Deleted Gmail => Deleted, switched to Soverin [0], works great, less than $4 per month for 25gb email hosting Drive => Deleted, moved to iCloud Docs => Deleted, use iWork for docs and Bear [1] for text Search => Duck Duck Go, getting better all the time Chrome => Safari, excellent battery life, good tracking protection Google Photos => Deleted, moved to Apple photos Next project is to move my website off of Google Analytics. I’d love to fully switch to Apple Maps as it’s getting better but don’t know if I fully trust it yet. Google Maps is the gold standard. [0] https://www.soverin.net https://www.soverin.net [1] https://bear.app https://bear.app

decasia 8y ago
Soverin sounds like a good project. What do you make of the fact that the warrant canary hasn't been updated since May, though? https://soverin.net/warrant-canary https://soverin.net/warrant-canary
- freehunter 8y ago
  Does Gmail even have a warrant canary? I don't think so, so comparing apples to apples it seems like a wash.
- rrcaptain 8y ago
  That's a poorly phrased warrant canary. Aren't warrant canaries intended to be for FISA-type warrants?
- ashelmire 8y ago
  Aren't warrant canaries valid until removed? Dates on them don't matter.
  - Buge 8y ago
    It says "Up to date as of: 2018-05-22". That seems to imply that it may have been invalidated at some later point. If it is valid until removed, then it shouldn't have a date at all.

wuschel 8y ago

Have a look at this HN thread called Alternatives to Google Products: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280558

mbrumlow 8y ago

I was a fanboy too and feel the same. The things that rub me the most seem to be problems I think from the way the hire people. The average stay at google is like 2.5 years, so most of the things I loved were created by people who are no longer there ( I am sure there are some staples that stay there, but ... ) They tend to higher young and fresh out of school people who know algorithms but seem to lack a strong foundation in computer history. Not just normal computer history (the why things are the way they are) but they lack even the historical history with the products they are working on. You can see this in the way their products have changed and either lost features, or changed features in a fundamental way that break them. I think many of the problems created area also created from the altitude that "they are the best and brightest so whatever they think must be right". I know this generalization does not hold true in all cases. This sort of attitude can be seen most recently in the way they are handling "www" and "m" domains, and then even suggesting that they would somehow just make the change and then assume they could push a standard on the rest of the internet. There are other cases but don't have the time or will to detail every one of them. The google today is not the google many of us fell in love with.

ardy42 8y ago
> I think many of the problems created area also created from the altitude that "they are the best and brightest so whatever they think must be right". I know this generalization does not hold true in all cases. This sort of attitude can be seen most recently in the way they are handling "www" and "m" domains, and then even suggesting that they would somehow just make the change and then assume they could push a standard on the rest of the internet. There are other cases but don't have the time or will to detail every one of them. This. That attitude will also result in an almost total inability to take valid feedback. If you incorrectly and arrogantly think your the best and brightest, why would you listen to the plebs when they tell you you're making a mistake. Then you get the plebs who buy into the best and brightest myth. They falsely assume whatever decision Google, Apple, or Facebook makes must be backed by air-tight reasoning, understanding, and skill; then praise turds to the heavens out of ignorance.
- mbrumlow 8y ago