I was already used to Debian Linux for 3 years.
I was already used the browser Mozilla Firefox + uBlock.
I was already used to having a dumbphone instead of a smartphone. (I don’t regret it).
This year, I started financially giving money to free open source software like VLC, Krita, Inkscape, Gimp, Qbittorrent. For too long, I have used amazing open source software without contributing. For far too long, I have taken them for granted. We live in a world where we should take nothing for granted.
I started buying Signal toothpaste (Unilever) instead of Colgate toothpaste (USA). Until I find a brand that is actually even smaller than Unilever.
But Google was the real challenge.
I had another email account, but my Gmail account had a ton of stuff on it. Youtube ? I liked it. But I can put my favorite channels in my bookmarks.
It took some time to sort out everything.
But I actually did it.
It’s over.
Finally.
FINALLY
Fuck the US social model. Inhuman vile shit :
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/02/10/inhaler-cost-death-optum-rx-walgreens/
Increasingly, this cancerous social model is spreading. Starting - as usual - with the British.
According to multiple sources who spoke to their favorite newspaper (The Financial Times), UK CEOs are now asking their friends on their boards to be paid exactly like American CEOs:
Resist US corporations. Resist huge multinationals.
Support non-profit organizations and small-medium sized businesses.
after ~20 years of being tangled up in google and even longer with microsoft, i’m in the process of doing the same. sooo many accounts, it’s hard to realize how embedded you are until you start removing all those tendrils
It’s time to depoison!
Congrats! This is a huge milestone.
Can I ask what you replaced google maps with? I’m trying to degoogle also but finding that tough as I rely on crowd sourced reviews of restaurants and attractions a lot.
I use the Map Complete food layer (uses OSM for the map data and Open Reviews Association for the reviews) https://mapcomplete.org/food.html? Best part is that if a restaurant is missing, you can add it yourself + no login needed to review
I honestly don’t think there is a replacement for Google Maps, I use Organic Maps from time to time but it is more difficult to use, rarely can I just input the name of a business and it finds it.
I suppose using it like a directory for restaurants and attractions could be done through the browser without an account but it is hard to deny Google Maps is a fantastic resource and hard to replace.
What about Mapy.com?
This looks interesting, it could be good to get away from Google. I never think about other proprietary system I always think first about moving to Open Source solutions.
The thing is Open Source solutions aren’t good enough when it comes to maps. It’s nice for going for a walk and sightseeing but it’s not practical.
For restaurant finding/scanning, I use https://happycow.net/
2-in-1 deal: data no longer goes to Google, money no longer goes to Big Agro
I do use happy cow also but I find it’s missing a lot of restaurants
Nice!!
I’m super close. I’m most nervous about my photos. That said, I’ve backed them up to Immich and have a second backup on an external drive.
I moved my email to FastMail for now and preserved the data in an external archive. Once I feel confident about my images, I’ll delete the data, then do the same for Gmail.
I’ll keep a burner Gmail account, but it’ll be for spam or throw-aways.
If your data is deleted, how can it be recovered? Hmmmm
It’s a practice called soft-deletion. The idea is that you flip a “deletion” flag on customer data and record the date of the deletion request. After some time, typically 30 days, a garbage-collection cron job will identify your data as having been “soft-deleted” N days prior, and then permanently wipe your data from their servers. This gives people a chance to restore their data in case they accidentally moved it to the trash or change their mind soon after.
Yeah that makes sense. Soft deletion is also a lot more efficient anyways. I wonder if it actually complies with GDPR etc. though? Like legally, does soft deletion really count as deletion?
Honestly it’s probably just held for a short period of time before finally being deleted.
Enough time to profit off it one last time.
Impressive
Way to go! I’m still working on that, but I’m close as well :)
Bit envious on the dumb phone part. I just can’t live without my bank app, browser and signal. There were these “half dumb half android” phones from Nokia and they seemed to work well with messaging apps but bank/browser was bit clunky.
I recently installed /e/OS on my phone. It’s based on Lineage OS, which is based on AOSP.
Bank apps work.
Battery lasts a week in sparse use.Its main feature is privacy, tracker blocker pictured:
Nice!!
What alternatives do you use now? (email, documents etc.)
I personally switched to infomaniak. Have one of their mails but also bought a domain via them and now have @kualdir.eu as well so I’m not vendor locked anymore 😄 currently using their free hosting as the client and app is great. Also they have a 1TB drive for 2 euros a month!
Very nice 👌 I strongly considered them but ended up going with Migadu
I think infomaniak is the better solution for most people, their UX seems good.
Price quality it was the best I could find that fits my needs. Proton is overpriced imo
Migadu seems pretty pricey as well as far as I see, what made you pick them?
Migadu is cheap AF, I pay 19€ a year.
And I can use my own domain and unlimited email address (so I can switch my whole family over for that amount)
I also love their No BS approach, they even list the drawbacks of using Migadu as one of the main links on their site https://www.migadu.com/procon/
not sure how small they are but for toothpaste, I use Bioniq, https://www.bioniq-oralcare.com/en-gb/
