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Thing is, the value proposition proposed by "the cloud", whomever that may be (MS/Google/Apple et al), is quite the temptation. Seriously, I am slowly and sure
by aboringusername 6y ago
Thing is, the value proposition proposed by "the cloud", whomever that may be (MS/Google/Apple et al), is quite the temptation.
Seriously, I am slowly and surely de-googling, such as storing all data locally (if I need offsite, I use encrypted backups). My calendar now uses caldav on a raspberry pi, my home network uses ethernet for fast data flow to a portable drive and I am using a web browser for many applications such as email; I use noscript and nextdns to selectively control my browsing experience. SSH is powering everything, including being able to access the device from any client connected to the network and if I wanted, from the internet as well (which can be quite useful, needs to be done sensibly however).
It's possible, but it does require effort, staying power (when installing a python package doesn't quite work because python 2/3 still...sigh) and is, quite simply, not something the average home user cares about.
Do they care an enforcement agent can access your documents via a warrant? or your metadata? or access your 'social circle' or profile you? Honestly, not really. But my threat model is that Google can and will use their AI army against you, and if you are unfortunate enough to get caught by them, there's little regards to you as an individual.
I can't risk my data being in a service with such little regard to humans, it's not acceptable and frankly, hosting everything myself is safer, more rewarding from a learning experience (such as how linux works and certain design decisions that are both good/bad and can be frustrating).
go de-google, it's a worthwhile venture.
[P.S: in a previous life I was vastly pro google. I used location history for years, google pay, play store, play games, stored youtube history and the whole works. Thanks to Snowden and forums like reddit/hackernews, I learnt that this was foolish. Giving up my data, for free, in return for little value back (why give them my financial information, for what? Google Pay is no different to my contactless card and that goes to bank directly). Cutting all these data flows was refreshing, and is part of the plan to delete or make my account dormant altogether. I am vastly more pro-privacy and take strict measures to reduce my digital footprint, which is entirely possible but requires additional effort, where the temptation of letting the "nice guy" handle all the work is always there. Paying in cash is still a thing and leaves less of a trace to 'you' as a person than digital]
- fossuser 6y agoThe only main Google service I still used was Gmail (and occasionally search when DDG doesn't return something immediately useful). I'd seen comments about Fastmail over the years, but moving seemed like it would be a hassle. With more at home pandemic time I decided to just do it and have been super impressed. The Fastmail docs are really good, setting up DNS to use my custom domain had explicit steps and pictures for my specific provider (gandi.net) along with a ton of others. They have super easy to setup import from Gmail to get things over initially and to keep things coming as you convert accounts. They have really good instructions for all IMAP clients and it's been painless to set those up. I did have to spend a day going through every account in 1Password and changing emails, but the super simple aliases you can setup in Fastmail make this great. I have a bunch of different ones for different types of sites (some very specific, some general catch-alls) on my domain which I can now blacklist in the future if I need to. The main issue is that you realize a lot of sites are just terrible, many don't let you change your email at all and require contacting support. Some don't even let you change after contacting support (postmates just says to 'create a new account under your new email and abandon the old one'). In general though I'm happy I did it and the Fastmail site has been pretty impressive. I like paying for software I think is high quality and valuable (where the business and customer have aligned incentives).
- komali2 6y agoI went through a similar process during quarantine, but for bluehost. I found the process of changing emails over meant I also was able to make Pass entries for them (another way I'm taking control of my data), and at the same time delete my account for websites I don't need anymore. It's been very cleansing.
- fossuser 6y agoWhat is a pass entry and what do you use it for? Another thing I should mention is I wanted to try hey.com since it looks like they’re doing some interesting things (alerting users to tracking pixels to push back on clients like superhuman, whitelisting incoming mail, etc.) but they make it hard to get an invite so I gave up trying and paid for fastmail instead.
- achillesheels 6y agoMy wake up call came in May 2018 when I was starting a cannabis dispensary YouTube channel and they decided to terminate all content creators. But this also included the gmail account. Completely. Flipping the switch off just like that made me realize I’m an idiot for using Gmail as my “central” email address (I’ve navigated all my critical emails offline and now use my own email server.)
- arkitaip 6y agoNot wanting to rely on Google - especially Gmail - as my central identity provider is why I switched to Fastmail. Sure it costs and the migration took a couple of days but it's been worth it.