Love this. Breaking off Facebook/meta felt great when I did it. Similarly with Spotify. We know they’re problematic and it’s amazing how much mental burden that develops over time with inaction. Pulling the plug can feel daunting but it’s so worth leaning into your values.
I highly recommend Ecosia to everyone as a default search engine within browsers like Firefox or Brave or even DuckDuckGo.
Thanks! I'll check out Ecosia, I actually hadn't heard of it?? It looks like the search function is powered by Bing in the back end, and it has a dependency on ad revenue. Everything has upsides and downsides... we just have to find equilibrium :)
The relationship with Microsoft is a problem and unless you’re clicking on ads, which I admittedly don’t, then ad revenue isn’t doing much for them. Financial transparency and status as an ethical non-profit are in Ecosia’s favour, and as an alternative I’ve found it an easy sell from a sustainability standpoint. Highly recommend might be an overstatement so let’s downgrade that!
But still I like it a lot as a conversation starter around ethical alternatives to google. It’s a trade off, but any improvement on the status quo that helps prompt folk to engage in consumer choice, as you are doing, is better than engaging with the behemoth out of ignorance.
Thank you Horseman!! Chatting to my wife, I found out she's already using Brave (which she particularly loves for the ad blocking). I think I need to make this switch as well, given the warnings I've heard about Firefox and a few other promising alternative browsers.
This is way to go, I've also been busy with it. You might want to look at Brave instead of Firefox. I'll send you a link as to why. The founder is a real privacy champ.
Re messenger I'm wondering why we still hold on to that need, ie if someone really wants to talk he/she should phone me via VOIP!
So to force that, isn't it better to get a good proper VOIP number, that works with a physical phone at home/office plus an App for when I'm travelling?
Great post! Never had a Facebook account, or Insta or Threads, but WhatsApp would be hard to leave due to other users tagging me in. Google almost impossible due to Gmail - can you port all your archived emails from one provider to another?
However, a standard Proton account has fairly limited storage, so I think you'd need to invest in storage space to retain them.
WhatsApp is annoying because people do keep creating more and more groups in there. It's early days for me, but I'm going to try to hold this line for now: "Thanks for inviting me! I don't have a WhatsApp account, but would you consider hosting this group on Signal? [insert info about the privacy benefits]"
Let's hope I don't cave in the face of resistance :p
I've had a couple of weak stabs at this but pretty much fell at the first few hurdles. I've managed to get myself onto firefox on my laptop. Annoyingly Substack doesn't seem to work quite as well through firefox on my phone, for some reason. And as you say, Google is so webbed into everything.... All nuts, of course. We used maps before we had Google maps etc.... I don't know anyting about signal, what's so good about it?
On Signal: surface functionality-wise, it's pretty much identical to WhatsApp. App-based 1:1 and group private messaging, including the usual multimedia stuff like gifs, images, video, etc. Super easy to set up and use, requires a mobile number.
Hi Ben - do you mean should they, or do they? Because some do, yes, and others may not have time, capacity or motivation.
Think about it a little like going vegetarian. Some vegetarians don't just give up meat, but get involved in activism on animal liberation or evironmental sustainability. Other vegetarians simply give up meat and go on living their (busy, complex) lives. If someone asks them why, they have a choice about how much to say in response.
As a (flexible) vegitarian living with my everyday complicty in a very screwed up world I like this sentiment a lot and your overall post and your work here on this type of big tech divestment. An inspiring exploration of the art of the possible, of creativity and of what human agency and dignity could mean.
I too am a flexible vegetarian, and one who has just bought a house with gas ducted heating in the middle of a southern hemisphere winter... we can't blame each other, but we can lift each other up... right???
Thank you Eamon, and happy birthday (for some day variously around about now, I assume!)
Love this. Breaking off Facebook/meta felt great when I did it. Similarly with Spotify. We know they’re problematic and it’s amazing how much mental burden that develops over time with inaction. Pulling the plug can feel daunting but it’s so worth leaning into your values.
I highly recommend Ecosia to everyone as a default search engine within browsers like Firefox or Brave or even DuckDuckGo.
Thanks! I'll check out Ecosia, I actually hadn't heard of it?? It looks like the search function is powered by Bing in the back end, and it has a dependency on ad revenue. Everything has upsides and downsides... we just have to find equilibrium :)
The relationship with Microsoft is a problem and unless you’re clicking on ads, which I admittedly don’t, then ad revenue isn’t doing much for them. Financial transparency and status as an ethical non-profit are in Ecosia’s favour, and as an alternative I’ve found it an easy sell from a sustainability standpoint. Highly recommend might be an overstatement so let’s downgrade that!
But still I like it a lot as a conversation starter around ethical alternatives to google. It’s a trade off, but any improvement on the status quo that helps prompt folk to engage in consumer choice, as you are doing, is better than engaging with the behemoth out of ignorance.
100%! Everything is entangled, and it's complicated and untidy, so we can't find all the answers at once. That's no reason not to ask :)
The links re BRAVE
https://www.productmonk.io/p/brave-browser
https://zapier.com/blog/brave-browser-review/
ENJOY!
Thank you Horseman!! Chatting to my wife, I found out she's already using Brave (which she particularly loves for the ad blocking). I think I need to make this switch as well, given the warnings I've heard about Firefox and a few other promising alternative browsers.
This weekend I'll be movin house :p
Hey Miriam,
This is way to go, I've also been busy with it. You might want to look at Brave instead of Firefox. I'll send you a link as to why. The founder is a real privacy champ.
Re messenger I'm wondering why we still hold on to that need, ie if someone really wants to talk he/she should phone me via VOIP!
So to force that, isn't it better to get a good proper VOIP number, that works with a physical phone at home/office plus an App for when I'm travelling?
Sincerely,
Horseman 👋
Great post! Never had a Facebook account, or Insta or Threads, but WhatsApp would be hard to leave due to other users tagging me in. Google almost impossible due to Gmail - can you port all your archived emails from one provider to another?
It looks like you can import your Gmail archives to Proton https://proton.me/support/export-import-emails
However, a standard Proton account has fairly limited storage, so I think you'd need to invest in storage space to retain them.
WhatsApp is annoying because people do keep creating more and more groups in there. It's early days for me, but I'm going to try to hold this line for now: "Thanks for inviting me! I don't have a WhatsApp account, but would you consider hosting this group on Signal? [insert info about the privacy benefits]"
Let's hope I don't cave in the face of resistance :p
Keep going!
I've had a couple of weak stabs at this but pretty much fell at the first few hurdles. I've managed to get myself onto firefox on my laptop. Annoyingly Substack doesn't seem to work quite as well through firefox on my phone, for some reason. And as you say, Google is so webbed into everything.... All nuts, of course. We used maps before we had Google maps etc.... I don't know anyting about signal, what's so good about it?
On Signal: surface functionality-wise, it's pretty much identical to WhatsApp. App-based 1:1 and group private messaging, including the usual multimedia stuff like gifs, images, video, etc. Super easy to set up and use, requires a mobile number.
On the development principles: this is a profile of the CEO, Meredith Whittaker, which gives a sense of the ethics of the founders. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/jun/18/encryption-is-deeply-threatening-to-power-meredith-whittaker-of-messaging-app-signal
Haha, maybe we'll see a resurgence of printed maps :p
so do people who quit these platforms also engage in advocacy against Google's negative practices? i.e. directly to the company?
Hi Ben - do you mean should they, or do they? Because some do, yes, and others may not have time, capacity or motivation.
Think about it a little like going vegetarian. Some vegetarians don't just give up meat, but get involved in activism on animal liberation or evironmental sustainability. Other vegetarians simply give up meat and go on living their (busy, complex) lives. If someone asks them why, they have a choice about how much to say in response.
As a (flexible) vegitarian living with my everyday complicty in a very screwed up world I like this sentiment a lot and your overall post and your work here on this type of big tech divestment. An inspiring exploration of the art of the possible, of creativity and of what human agency and dignity could mean.
I too am a flexible vegetarian, and one who has just bought a house with gas ducted heating in the middle of a southern hemisphere winter... we can't blame each other, but we can lift each other up... right???
Thank you Eamon, and happy birthday (for some day variously around about now, I assume!)