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How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

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Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#21

Post by awksed »

I usually just ignore this sort “I hate Google and so should you” post that pops up every now and then, it’s just a waste of time to bother with it, I thought this might be different but it isn’t. I stopped reading after the author recommended Hushmail so I didn't waste too much time.

Because even though I could almost tolerate the generic anecdotes, the overbearing tone, and the mandatory simplistic “NSA” invocation I couldn’t deal with the author suggesting shitty services with shitty privacy record and claim the opposite: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2007/11/encrypted-e-mai/

Also I think that members of the HN community by enlarge are perfectly capable of seeking alternatives by their own if they wish, so I don’t really get who is this post is supposedly for.

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#22

Post by abengoam »

hrkristian wrote: post #14
sb23 wrote: post #5

"At least with these options, you’re diversifying the companies you give your data to." Why is this better than giving it to one company? Won't I just get more ads?

The argument is the same as applied to governance, you don't want to give one person or entity too much power. I find the crusade against Google ridiculous for the most part, they're one of the few entities who are doing actual, quantifiable good in this world whilst demanding surprisingly little of me. Compare with for instance Facebook which is really just Zuckerberg's boyish stalker-fetish turned billion-dollar in…

The flip side of spreading your data across several providers is that you are increasing the odds of finding a problem. But the problem will have a smaller impact (hopefully).

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#23

Post by tyboki »

I usually just ignore this sort of “I hate Google and so should you” post that pops up every now and then, it’s just a waste of time to bother with it, I thought this might be different but it isn’t. I stopped reading after the author recommended Hushmail so I didn't waste too much time.

Because even though I could almost tolerate the generic anecdotes, the overbearing tone, and the mandatory simplistic “NSA” invocation I couldn’t deal with the author suggesting shitty services with shitty privacy record and claim the opposite: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2007/11/encrypted-e-mai/

Also I think that members of the HN community by enlarge are perfectly capable of seeking alternatives by their own if they wish, so I don’t really get who is this post is supposed to be for.

Edit: I just scrolled further down and the author actually recommends Microsoft and Apple stuff as alternatives while citing the NSA in the intro?! this is sick!

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#24

Post by curiouscats »

ZaneA wrote: post #15

I'd recommend Piwik ( http://piwik.org/ ) as a decent self-hosted alternative to Google Analytics that is quick to set up on any PHP based hosting.

I have been using it also and agree it is worth a look. I keep meaning to move more of my sites to using piwik but time keeps going by without that happening, [sigh].

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#25

Post by [deleted] »

pedalpete wrote: post #17

I don't think you really can 'De-Google-ify' your life. Think about it, if you visit a site and they're using Google Analytics, you're part of Google data. Same with sites using adwords. Firefox and Google are partners (hence the default Google Search in Firefox). You can avoid hosting your videos on youtube, but are you really not going to watch YouTube videos? Ever?? In the end, though you can cancel your Google Ac…

[deleted]

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#26

Post by mark_l_watson »

After consulting at Google last year, my position on them softened - really a pretty cool company, doing many good things.

I use an email address on my own domain, but route it through Gmail for convenience. It takes me about twenty minutes to reroute it, something I have tested a few times.

I did move my blog away from blogger last year, and I just use Chrome for Gmail, twitter, and Facebook. I do all other browsing using Firefox with tight security and anti tracking settings.

I think these steps are reasonable compromises that I also recommend to my non-tech family and friends.

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#27

Post by femto »

joelrunyon wrote: post #3

Author Here: Got gmail back when people were begging for invites and over the years found using their services out of "convenience". Lots of the recent changes have made me start looking for alternatives. I'm not technical, so I may have missed some self-hosted solutions, but I'm open to suggestions on anything I may have missed.

Taking up your mention of self-hosting, it would be interesting to see an attempt at the same article, but using only software from the Debian repository. Any takers?

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#28

Post by locusm »

vezzy-fnord wrote: post #9

Hush Mail – Hushmail is free email service with privacy and no ads. I haven’t used this personally but it’s a good option for the privacy-conscious. It certainly is. If you intend on getting fucked over. Hushmail has a history of complying with arbitrary appeals, and has sent plaintext transcripts of messages many times in the past. Look it up. Jacob Appelbaum also explicitly warned to stay away from them at this yea…

Plenty of FOSS howtos here http://www.howtoforge.com/howtos/email

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#29

Post by cromwellian »

abengoam wrote: post #22
hrkristian wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The argument is the same as applied to governance, you don't want to give one person or entity too much power. I find the crusade against Google ridiculous for the most part, they're one of the few entities who are doing actual, quantifiable good in this world whilst demanding surprisingly little of me. Compare with for instance Facebook which is really just Zuckerberg's boyish stalker-fetish turned billion-dollar in…

The flip side of spreading your data across several providers is that you are increasing the odds of finding a problem. But the problem will have a smaller impact (hopefully).

But you're not actually splitting your data across several providers, in many cases, you're making copies of the same data, and so you're actually increasing your exposure.

Re: How To De-Google-ify Your Life: The Complete Guide To Leaving Google

#30

Post by Filecloud »

joelrunyon wrote: post #3

Author Here: Got gmail back when people were begging for invites and over the years found using their services out of "convenience". Lots of the recent changes have made me start looking for alternatives. I'm not technical, so I may have missed some self-hosted solutions, but I'm open to suggestions on anything I may have missed.

check Tonido. It is a good self hosted alternative for Google Drive
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