====== degoogling ====== Sometime around 2021 I began to feel that use of Google services constituted a grave threat to my digital sovereignty, and began slowly moving off of them. Here in 2024 I still have a Google account and probably will for the foreseeable future, because Google Fi and Google Fiber remain the best cell service and internet service providers, and you need a Google account to pay for them. Today I use my Google account for five things: * As an OAuth identity for services that require one - literally just Tailscale, I have replaced everything else with email-based accounts * Filling out Google Forms - please stop using these folks, they often require a Google account * Access to shared Google Photos albums * Google Fi (cell service) * Google Fiber (internet) Despite these limited use cases, which are all provided for free with a personal-tier Google account, I still have to pay for Google Suite ($8/month). Why? Because years ago when I wanted to use a custom domain on my Gmail account, I started paying for Google Suite to enable this functionality. When you do this, your Google account is converted from a "Personal" to a "Business" account. This is a one way transition. Once this happens, if you stop paying for it, your level of services drops *below* that offered to a free personal Google account. So unless I want to completely disable my Google account (spoilers: I do, but not yet) I have to continue to pay Google, because they don't offer a downgrade path. Below I share what I have replaced various Google services with. ---- ==== Gmail ==== Migrated from Gmail first to Protonmail, and then in 2023 to Fastmail, which I am much more satisfied with. I was paying for GSuite for Business in order to use a custom domain name, now I pay Fastmail for that. ==== Search ==== I now pay for [[https://kagi.com/|Kagi]]. ==== Google Drive ==== This is a tough one. I have replaced Google Drive with a combination of the following * For files shared only among my own devices, I use a [[personal_infrastructure#storage|storage array]] on my home server mounted on all my devices (yes, even iPhone) via Samba * For files shared to others, I self host Filestash on my [[personal_infrastructure#public|cloud VM]], but this isn't ideal because of space limitations on the VM disk. Similar issue with Nextcloud. Recently (yesterday) I started using [[https://github.com/magic-wormhole/magic-wormhole|magic wormhole]] for p2p transfers and really like it. I have tried Syncthing but it's too hard to use for most people and is geared towards syncing and not transfers. Wormhole has [[https://rymdport.github.io/|GUI clients]] that are usable by plebeians. ==== Google Photos ==== For hosting my personal photos, I replaced Google Photos with [[https://www.photoprism.app/|Photoprism]]. Sharing photos is much more complicated. The usual situation for me is that I go on a trip with a bunch of people, and afterwards someone sets up a shared Google Photos album, everyone uploads their pictures to Google Photos and then adds them to the album. I am usually the odd one out complaining about this. So far I have done one of two things: * Uploaded my photos to the shared album, advised all participants that they will be deleted in 2 weeks, and then delete them in 2 weeks * Zipped the photos and shared directly via one of the methods described in the previous section This is much to the chagrin of people I go on group trips with, because they don't understand why I can't just use Google Photos like them and I end up being viewed as a source of inconvenience. Oh well. ==== Google Contacts & Calendar ==== I run Nextcloud on my home server and have replaced G services with Nextcloud's [[wp>CardDAV]] and [[wp>CalDAV]] implementations. These legitimately work better than Google Calendar and Google Contacts, especially on iOS which has first class support for CardDAV and CalDAV baked into the system; consequently system apps and facilities that rely on accurate calendar and contact sync work flawlessly. ==== YouTube ==== For hosting my own videos, I have replaced it with [[https://qtube.qlyoung.net/|Peertube]], although my YouTube channel is still up because I haven't gotten around to wiping it yet. Unfortunately [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhFsz0OqOJA|one video]] I made has popped off, and since it's educational I'm a little reluctant to take it down. I will probably make a video explaining how to get to my Peertube, upload that to YouTube, and then take everything else down. Then when I finally get around to deleting my Google account, that will disappear too. Of course I still watch videos on YouTube, and I still subscribe to channels. However, I do it via a self-hosted instance of [[https://invidious.io/|invidious]]. This way all my subscription data information etc is kept on my home server. On my iPhone I use [[https://github.com/yattee/yattee|yattee]] as a client to my Invidious instance, so I get a YouTube app-like experience. Also has the side effect of being ad-free :-) ==== Keep ==== Replaced first by Notion, and then Obsidian. ==== Android / Play Services ==== Bought an [[iPhone]]. {{tag>self-hosting technology}}