As yet another person outside of the USA I see the apps as being basically the same, all based on psychological research related to attention and how to get and

As yet another person outside of the USA I see the apps as being basically the same, all based on psychological research related to attention and how to get and keep it. I don't use any of them and block a number of them on my network at home so as to keep my daughters from becoming hooked. I do see a difference between the way these companies interface with their respective governments, as far as I know there is no USA equivalent of the Chinese version of the Soviet Nomenklatura. Especially since Xi Jinping came to power the CCP has been taking strides to reinforce its control over business [1], backed by a number of laws which mandate companies to assist the state when it so demands. So what do I do? I blocked TikTok a while ago, I blocked Facebook more or less forever. Instagram and Twitter are unblocked for now, the first because my 15yo daughter uses it, the second because nobody here uses it personally nor has any inclination of doing so while it is often used by others as a news distribution channel. We don't use Google directly but get search results through a local Searx instance which includes - among others - Google Search. We don't use Google Maps [2] , that task is relegated to ~OsmAnd (for navigation and mapping) and some local mapping sites. No Gmail, I run my own mail server. No Zoom, again using our own video conferencing (Jitsi Meet) and chat (Nextcloud talk) servers. No Google Docs, Libreoffice Online in Nextcloud works fine. In short we use no external services when we can avoid them, keeping nearly everything in-house and under our own control. A private VPN makes sure our data stays ours even when using public Wifi. While this may sound elaborate and in some ways probably is elaborate it makes it possible to reap the benefits of the 'net without ending up being milked dry by all those data herders out there, whether they're driven by profit maximisation or intended as tool in geopolitical power plays. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/25/china-business-xi-jinping-communist-party-state-private-enterprise-huawei https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/25/china-business... [2] ...which has the added benefit of not having to suffer through bouts of stupidity like Google's latest regressive piece of systemic racism where they start marking the skin colour of business owners when they're sufficiently pigmented: https://twitter.com/googlemaps/status/1288850928632832000 https://twitter.com/googlemaps/status/1288850928632832000