
How I Fully Quit Google (And You Can, Too) - benryon
https://medium.com/s/story/how-i-fully-quit-google-and-you-can-too-4c2f3f85793a
======
itchynosedev
I don't find it difficult to not use Google the search engine (instead opting
for DuckDuckGo, only resorting to Google but for the most challenging
queries). I found switching from Gmail to ProtonMail was a lot more hassle
than I thought it would be (yet I still maintain my Google inboxes because I
haven't updated my email on every online service yet)

I use Apple Maps when I need directions, but not when I need to look up a
business. I find Yelp integration atrocious and a bit of a slap in the face.

The browser is a tough one. I have a desktop computer, which Firefox runs very
nicely on.

However, on my Macbook Pro Firefox slashes battery by half, barely churning
through pages and a few tabs without grinding to a halt. It's not good enough
for Mac laptops, honestly. I tried. Trying Nigthly versions ever since 57.0
was released, profiling CPU usage, tracking bug reports, nothing helped. With
every version I am hopeful but I don't hesitate to quit Firefox app and keep
hoping the next version will be the golden build for retina Macbook Pro's.

~~~
thecleaner
I kinda agree with this. One place where I think user agnostic search engines
are better is that your bubble is burst by default. You can see the different
with Google and DDG. DDG sometimes does give outdated results but their
results change sufficiently when you change the search query, not so much with
google. Sometimes Google just keeps repeating the same stuff over and over.

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gregknicholson
Web browsers:

> Avoid Opera and Vivaldi, as they use Chrome as their base. Brave is my
> secondary browser.

Brave is based on Chromium too, isn't it? (I don't blame the author for not
knowing this; I'm not certain myself.)

~~~
skinnymuch
Yeah Brave uses Blink. I just went to its Wikipedia page and it’s in the first
sentence. Switching to Firefox would solve the browser issue though.

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diehunde
I think switching to Firefox is the easiest of all. You are not logged in with
your Google account all the time which I would think is a big deal.

My problem would be YouTube. I spend way too much time there and none other
site has half of the content.

~~~
jmngomes
Perhaps creating an account for Youtube only and/or browsing it inside a
Firefox Multi-Account Container [1] would already go a long way.

[1] [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/multi-
account...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/multi-account-
containers/)

~~~
some_account
You can browse the entire YouTube site and play videos without any cookies
even enabled.

If you don't have cookies, there are no logins by default. I've been
experimenting with this and almost all sites work fine without any cookies
these days (as long as you don't need to log in).

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samsa
I recently did the same thing. FastMail for email, Apple Maps for Google Maps
(not as good as Google, but better than when it launched), DuckDuckGo for
search, Firefox or Brave as my browser. I was not prepared for how long and
sometimes convoluted it was to change my email address on every site/service.
Some bafflingly did not allow me to change my email address. I use Microsoft
OneDrive for photo storage but am looking for an alternative. It did feel
momentous to delete my Google account, which was firstname.lastname@gmail.com.
But it also felt liberating.

~~~
peatmoss
> I was not prepared for how long and sometimes convoluted it was to change my
> email address on every site/service.

I’ve made this recommendation before, but buy your own domain. It’s cheap, and
will allow you to change your email hosting provider should Fastmail pivot
their business from email to surveillance.

It’s pretty easy to set up. Others have offered, and I’ll repeat it: if you
need a hand getting started, I’ll help.

EDIT: Fastmail’s instructions
[https://www.fastmail.com/help/receive/domains.html](https://www.fastmail.com/help/receive/domains.html)

~~~
krageon
The trouble isn't getting the domain and setting up the email server behind
it, the issue is maintaining the email server. I am sufficiently distractible
(and I'm sure I'm not alone) that it's very important that my peripheral
software/devices do not bother me. With an email server (or any other kind of
server really, but email is especially bad), you need to pay attention to it
constantly to make sure it is up, you are not on any blacklists (which you
will get on by default for the simple fact that you are a new host), etc.

You can of course set up all sorts of monitoring, but then you have to check
that that is working. These concerns never _really_ go away. You cannot truly
let your email slip from your mind, because if it stops working ever you will
miss emails (unless you use a relay, which is either external or also needs
monitoring, etc) and that means that potentially things get closed that should
not be closed, you miss things from the doctor/dentist, etc.

~~~
tincholio
But that would be the point of using an email host with your own domain,
right? Be it Protonmail, Fastmail, or any other, you only need to provide the
domain, and they provide the actual hosting.

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wheresvic1
It's great to see how far open-source tech has come that someone like the
author is able to switch to non-google services!

Moreover, I'd just like to mention that it would be fine to leave the gmail
account open if it was just for password resets, etc (I've left mine open for
whatever obscure service that I might have forgotten to switch over). It is a
bit annoying yes, but Google does not really get any data out of it from you
apart from knowing which services you have an account on.

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fazzz
I also in an attempt to freed from Google Services. I switch google search
engine to duck-duck go. When i used to search things related with programming
/ website that using "english language", DDG could compete Google. But when I
start to use DDG in my country (Indonesia), DDG is failing a lot against
Google.

About browser, i'd rather to use Safari & Firefox as a secondary browser.

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duiker101
I am trying to do this right now, I want to make android apps but I already
have one strike on my account and the threat of losing everything associated
with Google is too much. I already successfully moved my email but that took
something like a year. Finding all the places where I used that address wasn't
easy. I am now wrestling with photos, I haven't found a service that I like
yet. I'll try nextcloud but I am not very keen on paying for a vps just for
that and all my other have their resources allocated to running other
websites. Another VERY important one for me is really Google maps. I travel a
lot and both the public transport features and search are extremely useful.
And last but not least apps. I don't know if I can make it with just f-droid.
For example, neither maps.me or Here WeGo are on it.

~~~
systemtest
To avoid this problem in the future, I would recommend registering a domain
name and attaching an email address. I have switched to a different email
provider three times in the last ten years without changing my email address.

~~~
duiker101
Yep, that's what I did now with Namecheap and Fastmail

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hartator
Medium is funded in part by GV (Google Ventures), so maybe not fully out of
Google nest yet.

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ectospheno
Every alternative I tried for Gsuite handling email for some domains ended up
being less user friendly, more expensive, or both.

I love my iphone but Google Maps is better than Apple Maps in almost every
way.

I could live with DuckDuckGo if I didn't mind being annoyed 1 out of every 4
searches but I do mind. I mind a lot.

Google's Nearline cloud storage is silly cheap and always works.

From a security standpoint I have a hard time using firefox when I know chrome
exists.

In short, I've decided I'll just accept privacy is dead in exchange for not
being slightly angry each time I use a computing device. YMMV.

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evildino
What's the point of posting a Medium members-only article? No thanks.

~~~
abhishekjha
I am not a member nor am I signed in and I am able to read the article just
fine. Just delete your cookies for the website.

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mark_l_watson
Nice article by a non-techie. Although I am still a fan of Google (I worked
there as a contractor and have fond memories of the experience), I have taken
a middle of the road approach to Google.

I still use: Google Play Movies and Music, Google Cloud Platform, Google
Photos, and Google Drive. Notice the common thread: things I pay for and that
don't impact (too much) my privacy. I am a very happy customer of these
services.

What I avoid: Gmail, Google web site analytics, and search.

I rely on Fastmail (with their calendar and notes) in my day to day work.

~~~
soziawa
> that don't impact my privacy

> Google Photos

doesn't make sense to me

~~~
some_account
What about Google Drive, containing every document ever created on his
computers.

Google has for many reasons succeeded in getting techies on their side, to the
point that techies are standing by them, giving up privacy and integrity
completely to a giant ad company with close ties to military and government.
You could not make a worse choice for your privacy if you tried.

~~~
mark_l_watson
I do store some plain files to Google Drive and Dropbox, but mostly I created
backup ZIPs, GPG them, and store for backups. My working files are on my
laptop.

One thing I store as plain files on Google Drive is years of Communications of
ACM PDFs, and other purchased material - it is all searchable.

Mostly though, I agree with you.

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kevintb
Impressed someone who doesn’t know how to code has managed to do this.

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zyren
There's no alternative that even comes close to Google Inbox. Until then, i'm
staying in the google ecosystem.

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captainbland
Yeah I tend to use Firefox and try to use DuckDuckGo - but it just doesn't
seem to return results for software development that are as useful as Google
does. I'm not really sure why, either.

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midwestposdoc
If you live in China, the Great Firewall protects you from Google.

~~~
semperdark
Unfortunately, it can't protect you from China.

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satanicAdvocate
Quote from TFA:

    
    
      (yes, I don’t use Facebook either)
    

The thing is, I don't find the same seething contempt that Facebook manages to
evoke, when I use Google products. Google's stuff is legit, when push comes to
shove.

Really it's that they are such a potent organization, capturing so much raw
situational awareness that by way of monoculture alone, this represents an
existential hazard of sorts. Even if they can dodge the monopoly bullet on
paper, a rose by any other name...

By turns, comparing Google's products to what Facebook simply is, isn't even a
contest. Facebook is this deformed abomination afflicting the internet in the
worst ways possible.

Facebook is like thalidomide for ideas and cognitive capacity. When I browse
content on Facebook, not only is there some sort of stifling claustrophobia to
it all, but it's like the compromises made to present it within that awful,
awful user interface seem to dim the wattage on even the most amazing things.
The way people succumb to such a manipulative reality distortion field is
truly disappointing.

The reason to fight Google is much more subtle than the reason to fight
Facebook. At least with Google, they're producing things that work, things
that don't deceptively hobble practical utility in confounding ways. Facebook
is this underwhelming quicksand of unredeeming zombification.

