It's not fair to the public that FB bought up Insta/Whatsapp. That is a true lack of choice. If it were just FB, fine, ignore it, don't use it, use Whatsapp. But no, they get to buy up competition whilst telling us how much our privacy and integrity is taken seriously
What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
61–70 of 324 posts
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#62I'm actually building an alternative to Facebook for people fed up with Facebook and just want to stay in touch with people and not much more. I would go as far as calling it a glorified address book with some extra features for having up-to-date contact details for everyone that has granted you the privilege of having them and a very cut down version of the feed. Which brings me to the question of monetisation. I do…
I do like the 'address book' concept, though, and have toyed with similar ideas previously - a place for everyone to have a single page 'profile' with links out to their real social accounts etc. But in this age of privacy and tracking awareness, I don't think the average internet user will want to put all their contact info in one place.
The real problem with Facebook is that for most people it's frictionless... it's really easy for people who use it to chat and share with other users. For them, there's no real compelling reason to switch platforms. Asking them to at this point is like trying to sell a mobile phone on a new network that can't dial other networks.
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
I had zero issues quitting Facebook but replacing Gmail and Android? That's going to be really tough considering Gmail is my online identify hub and Android facilitates so many utility services (banking, electronic identification, money transfers, etc).
Register a domain if you don't already have one and get Fastmail for 5 USD/mo (includes a calendar as well). If Gmail.com is your online identity hub, then you're not in control of your online identity.
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#64DuckDuckGo is really changing my world. It’s like I’m seeing a whole other internet I was missing before with Google search results. I get much more relevant answers and less SEO targeted garbage that says all the right words usually while saying nothing at all. I was skeptical, but I encourage you to give it a try if you haven’t before.
I'm at about 90% Duck these days, and 10% Google. But I'm not sure it's because Duck got better, or because Google got worse. Google's results just seem less and less useful for the kinds of searches I do. A recent example: There was a news event near where I live earlier this week. It made national headlines briefly. Yesterday I wanted to know if there was anything new about it. So I hit the duck with my search quer…
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#65It's not fair to the public that FB bought up Insta/Whatsapp. That is a true lack of choice. If it were just FB, fine, ignore it, don't use it, use Whatsapp. But no, they get to buy up competition whilst telling us how much our privacy and integrity is taken seriously
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#66Google is relatively straight forward to replace. Inexpensive 80% solutions exist for most of their services. Maps is a notable exception. As for Facebook you're fighting against the greatest network effects in the history of mankind.
I had zero issues quitting Facebook but replacing Gmail and Android? That's going to be really tough considering Gmail is my online identify hub and Android facilitates so many utility services (banking, electronic identification, money transfers, etc).
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#67Google is relatively straight forward to replace. Inexpensive 80% solutions exist for most of their services. Maps is a notable exception. As for Facebook you're fighting against the greatest network effects in the history of mankind.
I had zero issues quitting Facebook but replacing Gmail and Android? That's going to be really tough considering Gmail is my online identify hub and Android facilitates so many utility services (banking, electronic identification, money transfers, etc).
Android is just simply unreplaceable, but it's FOSS at least.
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#68> Google knows everything you have ever searched for I thought this was an optional setting. It shouldn’t be saving or collecting this data if you have that turned off in your Google account. Hope so!
Theoretically, this could be used to identify you if all those parameters were unique to you
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#69It's not fair to the public that FB bought up Insta/Whatsapp. That is a true lack of choice. If it were just FB, fine, ignore it, don't use it, use Whatsapp. But no, they get to buy up competition whilst telling us how much our privacy and integrity is taken seriously
It’s interesting because capitalism is all about choice and competition. But what if a player is so successful that it can pay to absorb any competitor that poses a serious threat? I don’t know how capitalism self heals from that.
Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?
#70DuckDuckGo is really changing my world. It’s like I’m seeing a whole other internet I was missing before with Google search results. I get much more relevant answers and less SEO targeted garbage that says all the right words usually while saying nothing at all. I was skeptical, but I encourage you to give it a try if you haven’t before.
I'm at about 90% Duck these days, and 10% Google. But I'm not sure it's because Duck got better, or because Google got worse. Google's results just seem less and less useful for the kinds of searches I do. A recent example: There was a news event near where I live earlier this week. It made national headlines briefly. Yesterday I wanted to know if there was anything new about it. So I hit the duck with my search quer…