Bonum Certa Men Certa

Ways and Means to Reduce One's Dependency on Google's Various Monopolies and Near-Monopolies



LibertyBits 2019 - 18 - Richard Stallman - Mass Surveillance
Richard Stallman just weeks before he was pushed out of his office to help MIT save face



Summary: Getting rid of Google means a lot more than embracing DumbDumbGo (DDG) or some other sites that spy just like Google; we're taking stock of some options

THE legal action against Google wasn't misguided. It was likely selective, however, guided in part by Microsoft lobbyists (years in the making). Putting Microsoft's role aside, Google is a problem. Monopolies are a problem. Market dominance reduces the incentive to improve and can harm people in a variety of ways.



Maybe by mere coincidence, only hours before the lawsuit was unveiled Planet OpenSUSE had this post entitled "Migrating away from Google services" (we'll come back to it later).

"One popular alternative to Google or rather a YouTube sieve (offering the same material sans the surveillance and ads) recently shut down."Now, let's consider practical solutions to the Google problem. Monopolies like YouTube for instance...

Yesterday Debian announced its "donation for Peertube development," noting that "[t]his year's iteration of the Debian annual conference, DebConf20, had to be held online, and while being a resounding success, it made clear to the project our need to have a permanent live streaming infrastructure for small events held by local Debian groups. As such, Peertube, a FLOSS video hosting platform, seems to be the perfect solution for us."

One popular alternative to Google or rather a YouTube sieve (offering the same material sans the surveillance and ads) recently shut down. APIs and lawyers had also similarly killed Scroogle (not to be mistaken for Microsoft's rogue AstroTurfing campaign). We're talking about invidio.us here, being a YouTube alternative. But it was Free software-based (GNU Affero General Public License, version 3.0), so other instances of it still exist. It should be noted that some are unsavoury and are linked to bad people, some are not.

yewtu.be is one alternative of interest -- at least until Google's lawyers shut it down using threats. In yewtu.be one can escape annoying Google ads, spying (JavaScript) and spurious pop-ups urging viewers to "log in" (it got a lot worse recently). yewtu.be also supports embedding videos, searching (however limited, better insert direct YouTube URLs into the search box as a starting point).

Scroogle screenshotRegarding search, the decentralised approach works better because Startpage turned into a scam; along with other so-called 'private' search engines it was quietly passed into the claws of surveillance giants. The same is true for DumbDumbGo (DDG), where many people still dumbly go to spew/infuse personal information (because of empty promises and plenty of misleading marketing campaigns). SearX instances keep going up and down, but the one which nowadays works reliably (and has worked for months) is searx.feneas.org (not recommended on the basis of deep research into how they handle their data).

Google News is a near-monopoly when it comes to indexing news in (almost) real-time. I've never managed to find a solid and reliable alternative to it. Google News isn't consistent either (more and more spammy results in it over time), so I rely on it a lot less. Google News is pretty much the only Google service I cannot fully get rid of.

Apparently many people out there still rely a great deal on Blogspot, GMail and various other non-essential 'services' (to which plenty of good alternatives exist). People who can't figure out how to get rid of Blogspot and GMail are probably a 'lost cause' when it comes to ridding them of Google. Seriously, how hard can it be to just open an E-mail account somewhere like GMX or ProtonMail? Then telling people, over time, about the new address? I myself haven't had such issues since 2003 when I registered my own domain and managed all my mail there (about 20 E-mail accounts to separate the wheat from spam/chaff, mostly with aliases).

Going back to the post from Planet OpenSUSE, it says this:

My inbox tells me I started using GMail around 2004. The oldest mail I can find in my archive is from 16 years ago. After Gmail, Google Photos, Keep, Docs, Drive and Fit followed.

I have reasons to stop. Whether your reasons are privacy, the U.S. as a data harbor, GMail becoming sluggish, karma for killing Inbox, fear about getting your account locked, or you found a better email provider, the objective of this post is not to convince you about my reasons but to help you with a migration plan and showing you alternatives.

Breaking the dependency on Google services is really hard. This dependency was a showstopper and motivator at the same time. If you are locked-in at this level, something is wrong.



This is correct. Take time and invest effort to become technically and technologically independent, or at least less prone to abuse (censorship, surveillance and so on).

Google isn't the most harmful company to us GNU/Linux/BSD users who value software freedom. But Google poses a great threat to privacy -- probably a more potent and long-lasting threat (in that particular domain/aspect) than Microsoft ever will.

Like we've said countless times before, getting rid of Microsoft isn't enough. If we get rid of one brand only to be abused by another, then we're simply not aiming correctly. To a lot of people out there, their 'activism' (or principle) boils down to "I'll swap Microsoft with Apple" (basically defecting between brands). Right now in Manchester they have a massive marketing campaign (billboards and all) associating iPhone with "privacy"; we always get a kick out of it, as if iPhone users covering their faces with a tracking device (with microphone and multiple cameras, not to mention back doors) is "privacy"... Apple is just 'pulling a DumbDumbGo'.

Image credit: By Ewald, Fair use

Recent Techrights' Posts

Changing One's Name Won't Change One's Past
People who have earned a bad reputation are not magically "entitled" to reset
People Who Assault Women Are Not Victims of "Distress"
It seems like an American tradition. In a country with almost 50 presidents, not even one was a female.
Adoption of Gemini Protocol Still Growing
Gemini Protocol is being obscured by the media - it doesn't help that Google 'hijacked' the word "Gemini" - but people still manage to find out about it, download a client, and use it
Brett Wilson LLP "Takes it Personal" (Character Assassination, Not Professionalism). Everybody Can See That.
On behalf of violent men
Pissing Contests and Pissing Off Everyone
people who came from Microsoft are trying to vex and divide the community
Microsoft Repeats the Mistakes Made by the EPO After We Exposed a Major Microsoft/EPO Scandal 10 Years Ago
That scandal was all over the media, not just in English
 
Links 14/07/2025: Chatbots Broken Again, McHire LLM Shows Limits of the Hype
Links for the day
Slashdot Media Turned Linux Journal Into a Slopfarm and Now Slashdot Actively Promotes Anti-Linux Slopfarms
Yes, "no-nonsense" apparently means actual nonsense
Links 14/07/2025: Arresting Photographers, Threats to Revoke US Citizenship Over Criticism
Links for the day
More EPO Leaks on the Way
We hope that Mr. Rowan will actually try to refute what we say and show, not merely point the finger at the messengers
Decommodification is a Corporate Strategy Against Communities
systemd is led by Microsoft and hosted by Microsoft
copyleft.org 'Hijacked' by the People Who Attack the Person Who Created Copyleft
So far there's nothing "tasteless" in copyleft.org, but that can change at any time in the future
Asking People to Take Down Articles and Videos Only Makes These More Popular and "Viral"
If you do something bad, one of the worst things you can possibly do it try to silence those who speak about it
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 13, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 13, 2025
Two-Thirds Towards FSF Goal, Richard Stallman to Give Talks in Europe
There are 67 left before reaching the target
Gemini Links 14/07/2025: Politicised Tech and "Leaving GitHub"
Links for the day
The Demise of LLMs
We've just checked BetaNews again. They've dropped all the slop and went back to human authors.
Gemini Links 13/07/2025: Sonpo Museum of Art and FCEUX
Links for the day
Links 13/07/2025: UnitedHealth's Censorship Campaign, Australia Wary of China
Links for the day
Firing Away With Nonsense
Or fighting fire with fire
Links 13/07/2025: Climate Crisis, GAFAM Poisoning the Water
Links for the day
Turns Out LLMs for Code Don't Save Time and Don't Improve Quality
Neither legal nor useful
The Microsofters Will Have an Obligation to Compensate Us
This story isn't just about Microsoft. It's also about corruption, there are many women victims, there is abject "abuse of process", and many more scandals to be illuminated in years to come.
Reproducing at the EPO Instead of Producing Monopolies for Foreign Monopolies With Their Price-Fixing Cartels
Does the EPO recognise the need of well-educated Europeans to bear kids?
Valnet Inc. Dominates Real (Not LLM Slop) GNU/Linux Coverage in 2025
And likely in prior years, too
Free Software Foundation (FSF) Fund Raiser Goes on
Later this month we'll expose another OSI scandal
EPO Staff Representatives Issue a Warning About Staff's Health and Inadequate Care
Even the EPO's own stakeholders (money sources) are openly protesting against what the EPO became
Links 13/07/2025: Partly Assorted News From Deutsche Welle and CBC
Links for the day
Gemini Links 13/07/2025: Board Games and Battle Styles
Gemini Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 12, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, July 12, 2025
Plunder at the Second-Largest Institution in Europe
cuts, neglect, health problems, even early deaths
Links 12/07/2025: Political Developments, Attack on Opposition, Climate Actions
Links for the day
Gemini Links 12/07/2025: Melodic Musings and Small Web July
Links for the day
Links 12/07/2025: Jail in China for Homoerotica, South Korea Discriminates Against Old Workers
Links for the day
If Only Everything Was Rewritten in Rust, We'd Have No More Security Issues?
Nope.
Links 12/07/2025: Birdwatching and Fake/Misleading Wall Street 'Valuation' Figures
Links for the day
Gemini Links 12/07/2025: How to Avoid Writing, Apps for Android
Links for the day
Using SLAPPs to Cover Up Sexual Abuse and Strangulation
The exact same legal team of the Serial Strangler from Microsoft and Garrett already has a history fighting against "metoo"
EPO Staff Committee on Harassment in the Workplace
slides
Adding the Voice of Writers to UK SLAPP Reform
The journey to repair antiquated (monarchy era) laws will likely be long
EPO Takes More Money From Staff for Speculation (Pensions), Actuarial Study Explains the Impact
"The key change in this year’s Actuarial Study, due to cascading the new “risk appetite” from the financial study, is a significant increase of the total pension contribution rate of 5.7 percentage points, up to a total of 37.8%. This is driven by an unprecedented decrease in the discount rate of 105 bps down to 2.2%."
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 11, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, July 11, 2025