
We don't need Google - newsat13
https://www.jacoduplessis.co.za/we-dont-need-google/
======
angryasian
I hate this statement " I don't want Google to sell my data so that they can
blow the money on half-baked Google X projects"

Someone please tell me how can I buy your data and who exactly is google
selling my personal data to ?

Also google x projects have moved the needle in VR / AR, self driving cars,
and in some cities fiber has made a difference. Really I don't get why we'd
want to not fund this stuff.

~~~
dwaltrip
It's my hunch that having immense data on all humans in one place, along with
the potential to take programmatic action based on that data, may
significantly increase the risk of massive, harmful affects on society on the
decade to century scale.

This may involve governments or other powerful entities co-opting the data,
which there are increasing hints of. It doesn't even have to be some kind of
catastrophy. One scenario I imagine would be something mundane like preventing
an alternate future where the majority of people are twice as happy and have
twice as much autonomy.

Obviously, this can't be proven. But this hunch gives me great pause.

~~~
angryasian
>It's my hunch that having immense data on all humans in one place, along with
the potential to take programmatic action based on that data

If you understand the Prism program the govt doesn't even need to go to
individual companies. They hook directly into the ISP.

------
alanfranzoni
Of course you don't strictly need Google. You can live without it.

But will the quality of your internet life be the same? Good luck with
alternative search engines result quality.

And the price? Just the email provider you suggest will cost you $48 a year -
vs $0 for Google.

Would you like to pay? Fine. The whole point is that Google, in order to
provide all those services without paying, actually asks something from you -
your data. Just like Facebook and Twitter. Consider G Suite as well, since its
privacy guarantees are different from free gmail accounts.

~~~
ams6110
I started using DuckDuckGo a few years ago. Initially, I would find myself
using Google at least a few times a day if DDG didn't turn up what I was
looking for.

As time went on this was less and less the case, and now I hardly ever use
Google for web search. DDG results are a lot better than they used to be and
almost always as good as Google in my experience.

~~~
EarthIsHome
I've also had this experience with DDG. Other people I've turned on to DDG
have also experienced this.

I can't tell whether their search algorithms have gotten better or I've gotten
used to DDG results.

------
osti
I do lots of road trips to places I've never been, and I can't imagine doing
it without Google Map. No idea how people in the past did it. For me
personally, I could maybe do without other Google services, but without Google
Map? Forget it. Actually, Google Search seems irreplaceable either.

~~~
kafkaesq
_I do lots of road trips to places I 've never been, and I can't imagine doing
it without Google Map._

You've never heard of Bing Maps, or OpenStreetMap?

Aside from the fact that before 2005 or so, people used to travel to all kinds
of fascinating, exotic places around the world with maps made of... get
this... paper.

~~~
wutbrodo
Sure, and people used to get around with horses and buggies. But it's not much
of an exaggeration to say that for a lot of people in a lot of places, life
without the internal combustion engine isn't feasible.

Pointing out that people used to use an inferior tool to do the same thing
less effectively is kind of a dumb response to someone mentioning how critical
a tool is.

No real disagreement with the Bing/OSM recommendations tho

~~~
wott
Using a map is not inferior. Quite the opposite. Once thing I noticed with
most people who use GPS directions is that they have no idea where they are,
no idea of their environment.

When you use a map, you see the geography of the territory as a whole. You
know if you go North or North-West, you know what is located near your
itinerary and your destination, you know the different possibles ways, which
ones are more direct or straight, which ones are longer but less steep and
winding (and you know why: because of some geographical obstacle that you will
later remember as a landmark as you walk/drive by it), you have a general idea
how to recover if you take a wrong direction at some point or if for some
reason you have to change your route.

These are quite many points for which the real map is superior.

And please: there is no "critical" tool there.

~~~
eviltandem
You sound like my grandfather.

Using the mail is not inferior. Quote the opposite. One thing I noticed with
most people who use the internet is they have no idea of their environment.

When you use the mail, you get a better understanding of how information
travels. You see stamps, feel the paper, get hand cramps when you write too
much. You see which post office a letter came from.

These are quite many points for which the real mail is superior.

And please: there is no"critical" tool there.

------
whodknee
I have recently given up Google and most of it's products _. And I find some
of the things on this list are not relevant for the average person. Here is my
personal list:

Google Search (DuckDuckGo) Gmail (ProtonMail) YouTube (_There's pretty much
nothing because of the networking effect YouTube has. But, if you just want
something to share videos, there's Media Goblin) Google Drive (NextCloud)
Google Keep (Wallabag/Pocket) Google Maps (OpenStreetMap) Google Calendar &
Contacts (NextCloud) Google Docs (LibreOffice Online)

~~~
hlassen
Thanks for the list. Are you running this on a single server and install them
manually? How hard do you think this is for the average (somewhat technical)
person?

~~~
whodknee
Sorry for the late response. Nextcloud is super easy to install. It is as
simple as extracting the zip file in your web server directory.

You don't need more hardware to run it either. I have mine running on a
raspberry pi 3.

------
selectnull
If someone is interested in kicking Google out of their life, I can recommend
reading about how Bryan Lunduke embarked on that mission. He wrote a series of
articles in 2015, here are direct links to them:

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2940176/opensource-
subne...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2940176/opensource-
subnet/kicking-google-out-of-my-life-day-1.html)

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2940569/opensource-
subne...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2940569/opensource-
subnet/kicking-google-out-of-my-life-part-2-leaving-android-is-not-so-
easy.html)

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2941717/opensource-
subne...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2941717/opensource-
subnet/kicking-google-out-of-my-life-part-3-a-surprise-android-replacement-
emerges.html)

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2942161/opensource-
subne...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2942161/opensource-
subnet/kicking-google-out-of-my-life-part-4-goodbye-gmail.html)

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2946696/opensource-
subne...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2946696/opensource-
subnet/kicking-google-out-of-my-life-part-5-replacing-google-docs-and-
drive.html)

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2949819/opensource-
subne...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2949819/opensource-
subnet/kicking-google-out-of-my-life-part-6-why-i-prefer-duckduckgo-for-
search.html)

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2971168/linux/kicking-
go...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2971168/linux/kicking-google-out-
of-my-life-part-7-why-i-relapsed-and-will-again-soon.html)

[http://www.networkworld.com/article/2977884/opensource-
subne...](http://www.networkworld.com/article/2977884/opensource-
subnet/kicking-google-out-of-my-life-part-8-will-i-ever-go-back.html)

------
kafkaesq
Some of these services are roughly interchangeable with competitors; others,
not so much.

Vimeo, for example, has nowhere near the (truly insane) variety and depth of
YT, content-wise (such that it doesn't even try to compete with them, on that
level). If you think you can decide to just "never open a YouTube video,
ever"... you're just not going to see a lot of stuff that's happening in the
world.

Similarly with Google Docs. Its viability has very little to do with the
simple feature of it being a cloud-editable word-like doc -- but rather the
fact that it's easily _sharable_ (or "easily enough", provided you have a
Google Doc). It's incredibly popular for a whole lot of basic collaboration
tasks. If you think you can boycott it... you're just not going to be able to
collaborate with a whole lot of people.

Network effects (and in particular, lock-in) are very real. Even though you
may not like them very much, pretending that you can just make them go away
(by using lesser-known alternatives) just isn't going to work.

------
dwaltrip
Why was this flagged? It seems relevant to many here and reasonably written.

~~~
ebcode
Good question. Seems like people aren't using the flag function responsibly. I
would like more transparency on this as well.

It would be cool if the mods would add a required text box for stating the
reason something is flagged. HN just makes it too easy to flag something you
disagree with.

------
iamleppert
I also don't like how Google makes all this money from advertising and then
dumps into their poorly done Google-X projects. That money would be better off
spent in the free market it seems.

What is it about Google X that doesn't really lend to either real product
development, or even cool tech (of late?). For the amount of money they put
into it, I expect a lot more output.

At their core they are still a big company and attract the kinds of people who
want to work for a big company. Usually, this at direct odds to people who
seek out the startup environment. There are some notable exceptions but the
basic premise generally holds true.

~~~
int_handler
Please provide some evidence that the majority of Google X projects are
"poorly done."

Self-driving cars -> Not only has it become its own company (Waymo) but it
also motivated many other companies to tackle the same problem and develop
self-driving tech of its own.

Life Sciences, Google Contact Lenses -> Now its own company, Verily.

Google Brain -> I quote Astro Teller "It would be fair to say Google Brain
(now called the Neural Network Project) is producing in value for Google
something that would be comparable to the total costs of Google X — just that
one thing we’ve spun out." [https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/googles-
captain-of...](https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/googles-captain-of-
moonshots-on-making-profits-at-google-x/?_r=0)

Hard science and engineering problems take non-trivial amounts of resources to
solve. How many start-ups are tackling the kinds of problems that X is trying
to solve?

------
Paul-ish
I use Android and I'm not interested in messing around with custom ROMs. This
really chains me to having a google account unfortunately. I really wish the
Firefox phone had worked out. Maybe the Ubuntu phone will succeed there.

~~~
pmontra
You don't have to use that account for anything except Google Play. I use Maps
and YouTube without being logged in, no GMail. I use Drive for the customers
that use it. I don't use Google Now. I do use Google as search engine but in
the browser, either Firefox or Opera.

~~~
xaqfox
Is it possible to use your phone's GPS without sending all data to Google
(i.e. enable GPS without also enabling Google Location Services)?

~~~
pmontra
I think it depends on the app. I wrote an app that read from the GPS sensor
and sent the position to a server of mine. Google didn't get any data. However
if you want to use other sources to get a more precise position (example: wifi
access points) I think that Google must know.

------
joemi
Not that Google definitely won't decide to shut down their services (I still
remember you, Google Reader!), but I'm extremely hesitant to commit to some
alternate services. I've been burned so many times when thinking "ah, what a
great service!" and then it vanishes after I've grown used to it an can't
imagine my life without it. I'd much rather move to self-hosted for as much as
possible. But then that leads to the bother of installing and maintaining
things. And then I'm back to being lazy and sticking with Google services.
It's my eternal cycle.

------
jiblyyyy
Would be an interesting project to follow. An even more interesting journey
would be to document the entire process and only use/make open source products
as a replacement of each Google product.

~~~
dest
check the French non-profit Framasoft with "degooglisons internet":
[https://degooglisons-internet.org/](https://degooglisons-internet.org/)

------
tenkabuto
Are any of you familiar with an open source/libre app for public transit
routing information that'd replace Google Maps?

~~~
logic
If your local transit agencies are supported (or you're able to add them to
the upstream library they use to collect this data), Transportr seems like a
good choice: [https://transportr.grobox.de/](https://transportr.grobox.de/)

Sadly, it doesn't cover any of the agencies in the Bay area, so I've had to
rely on Transit (transitapp.com) from the Play Store.

------
logic
I just finished most of this transition for my own purposes, with the main
difference that I decided to self-host most of the services I was previously
using Google for. Some highlights:

* Android: if you really want to divest yourself from Google, Android is going to be a showstopper for any but the most committed people. I'm running LineageOS (nee CyanogenMod) without gapps, using microG as a collection of play services API replacements. While that keeps me from adding a google account to the phone (which is the main thing I'm trying to avoid), I still end up needing something like Yalp Store (available from F-Droid) to download and update Play Store apps, because there are a few I actually can't get by without a huge level of inconvenience. I did all this because I enjoyed the challenge of it; for normal people who aren't intrinsically motivated by this stuff, I suggest buying an iPhone and saving yourself the headache. Seriously.

* Email was the easiest thing to move, and the hardest to get right. I remember when I originally moved my email to Gmail, and noted a marked increase in spam; the same thing happened when I moved off of Gmail last month. A combination of postfix, dovecot, spamassassin, and a lot of tweaking has me mostly back to the point where I was when I was with Google. I've been using Rainloop for a use-anywhere web UI, although I've used Roundcube in the past and was pretty happy with it. On mobile, I'm actually using k9mail, despite how dated it is, because it actually gets IMAP right; both the stock "Email" app and Gmail had sporadic issues with IMAP that I got tired of dealing with.

* Meanwhile, calendaring was the messiest part of the move, mostly because CalDAV is a bit of a mess, and both client and server implementations leave a lot to be desired. I ended up using sabre/dav on the backend because I could tweak and extend it quite a but to do what I need, and because it had baked-in support for CalDAV scheduling, which is something I can't really live without. I'm using DAVdroid on Android for both calendar and contact sync, which is great _except_ for scheduling, which I can't really use. (A combination of what looks to be some misbehavior in davdroid, and android limitations in the calendar API.)

* More calendaring: are you used to having your calendar invites just magically show up in your calendar? Yeah, that's probably not going to work anymore. I'm been writing an itip milter that scans for text/calendar mime parts in incoming email and shoves them in an appropriate caldav store, but it's going to be pretty hacky even if I finish it. ;) If you're looking for better integration here, look at something like Zimbra; it's a huge pain in the ass to run, and it's resource-heavy, but when it's running well it's amazingly polished from the end user's perspective. Or give FastMail some money, because they've been doing this for a long time, and do it really well.

* Docs, photos, file syncing in general: There's a bunch of options here. I almost ended running an instance of NextCloud (nee OwnCloud) for this, because it would cover a few different use cases (document storage, photos, calendaring, contacts, etc), but settled on Syncthing as a general file synchronization tool. I'm hosting a cloud instance that my laptop, mobile devices, etc. can all talk to, as well as an instance on a machine at home, giving me pretty good coverage for on-demand backups. I try to avoid working in heavyweight document formats for personal stuff (markdown and a text editor works for my use case most of the time); for things I have to share or where I need more powerful tools, LibreOffice. I don't have a good photo management solution right now beyond "directory full of photos synced from my phone and camera".

* Books: I had bought a bunch of books on the Play Store. This was a painful lesson in how bad the state of DRM in ebooks is, especially if you don't have a Windows machine lying around. I ended up having to install Adobe Digital Editions under Wine, then used a Calibre plugin to automatically convert DRM'd ebooks via ADE when I have it import them. I share the Calibre collection to my tablet via syncthing, so changes, read positions, etc. sync nicely. (I don't mean to pick on Google on this one; the DRM issue seems to be a mess with every bookseller right now.)

* Music: Exported my music using Music Manager, sync with Syncthing, and access streaming music with Spotify. Done, easy.

* Maps: I use Google Maps, logged out (it's one of the few Google apps that continues to function properly even without a Google account on the device). OsmAnd~ is a great idea, and I use it as a fallback when I'm outside of cell coverage, but I find it almost impossible to use in a day-to-day context (if you have it open gmaps links/intents, it almost never figures out the address I'm looking for, and I've had terrible luck relying on it for navigation). Note that without logging in, you cannot save Google Maps data offline, because apparently gmaps engineers are a little bit spiteful.

* Search: I've defaulted to DuckDuckGo for years. Yes, sometimes I hit "!g" to search Google, but I don't default to them, and haven't for a long time. Also, shock of shocks, bing is getting pretty good.

* Android Pay: I opted out. I have credit and debit cards, and I have cash. Some people might find this to be a deal breaker, I find it hasn't changed my life in any significant way.

* Browsing: Firefox. Not really a change for me.

There's a bunch of smaller one-off services that I've used over time, but
those are the big ones from a personal perspective. For some folks, a large
chunk of these can be handled by running an instance of NextCloud, and you'll
get a polished, fairly integrated experience for the parts they can cover.

At some point, I should probably write this up with more details about the
tradeoffs I made with each piece.

