This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Hopefully DeGoogleing will go a bit like the cable "Cord Cutters" did in terms of headlines over time:
Of course, streaming is worse than cable now... so lets learn from that.
"streaming is worse than cable now" is it though?
I stream for weeks on end without a single ad, watching only what I want. I go to an older person's house and I hear the same friggin commercial jingles, the same canned studio laughter, and shows that are designed for the stupidest common denominator.
I grew up in the era of Saturday morning cartoons. My brain was liquidified on cereal commercials. I won't allow cable into my house under any circumstances.
But I do agree that we should learn from too easily replacing the working with the next big thing without any regulations on how the next big thing is allowed to operate
I stream for weeks on end without a single ad
But that's now changing. The bottom tiers of many (most?) streaming apps include ads, and it's not a stretch to think that they'll include ads on the higher tiers eventually, or just increase prices until people downgrade to ad-supported tiers. Yeah, you can use an ad-blocker, but you could also use a DVR for cable that also filters out ads.
I'm bailing on both and just buying physical media again. I hope that doesn't die out, but I'm done with paying for subscriptions. We don't watch a ton, so I'm probably going to save money this way.
I wish we had a streaming equivalent of a DVR, then I might actually want streaming again.
"streaming is worse than cable now"
Ironically, pirating has never been easier lol
Between private torrent trackers and Usenet, pirating has never been easier. I love it!
Its worse in that to see the content I want I need MULTIPLE subscriptions that add up to more than cables cost ...or I can sail the high seas once more. I've cancellled everything except amazon because I save enough on shipping to justify it (mostly heavy items)
its a human flaw... insatiable greed.
we distilled this greed and removed all actual responsibility creating an entity, 'the stock market'. this well of irresponsible greed has reached a singularity.... a point of no return. we are all too dependent on this terrible thing and so it cant be removed.
the majority of us just get to suffer while being told 'theres no other way'
we cant have nice things because humans are just so fucking greedy and incapable of controlling that greed.
No, it’s a capitalist flaw. Capitalism is not an intrinsic trait of humanity. We can create systems that have effective self-regulation and appropriate feedback loops. It’s just that most countries, for one reason or another, haven’t really tried.
I disagree, I think it is basic human/biologic that drives us to grab up resources and hoard them to ensure survival/reproduction/future generations. Capitalism is just a vehicle in which we are capable of expressing that biological greed on a global scale.
I'd argue that capitalism is unnatural because even if we work from the assumption that resource hoarding is natural, it's also necessary to take into account the fact that evolutionarily, humans got to where we are via traits like altruism, cooperation and forming communities. Capitalism is far from natural — it's an insidious subversion of human nature
Cooperation and community are not altruistic. You literally can't do 99.9999999% of the work required to build a civilization — nobody can — so cooperation benefits ME, until greed benefits ME more!
I'm not saying that cooperation and community are not the most beneficial for humanity; just that selfishness is an evolutionary trait that stretches back hundreds of millions of years longer than community, or rearing our young.
for one reason or another
Greed, mostly lol
Hate Google ain't enough, plebs need to deny Google profit.
That's how you hurt a parasite.
I'm currently de-Googling my life. Moving all my services over to Proton, testing other search engines, etc. Trying to slowly cut out/replace all services that Google provides me.
Oh, and I'm sticking with Firefox with Ublock Origin, to ensure Google can't ever advertise to me, even incidentally.
I finally gave up on Edge with the coming ad-blocker changes. Moving back to Firefox after a decade+ was super easy, hardly a blip in my day.
I'm not fully de-Googling, however I have been migrating things that Google does badly over to other services. Kagi for search was the latest, and admittedly hardest mentally for me to do. Not because the search engine itself isn't fantastic (it is), but I've been using Google since its inception when I stopped asking Jeeves or Hotbot. Just feels weird to jump ship, but I'm so tired of how bad and enshitified their search has become that I just can't do it anymore.
I actually have a Proton acct already but only use the VPN. Sounds like it's time to look further into the other offerings.
ProtonMail is not bad at all!
GOOD WORK SOLDIER
I haven’t used any Google produces or services for the better part of a decade now and my life has been fine. I haven’t used Facebook or any non-forum-type social media either and my life has been BETTER!
I stopped using protonmail as moving thr data out and exporting / archiving old emails is nightmare. I use simple mailbox.org and it's fine. I use on desktop pop3 and imap on mobile. I remove my emails automatically from servers older than 30 days
Why only deny Google? Attack them all with a blow to the stock market. The further it ticks down the more they bleed.
yes, there are many ways to do this. once you ID corpo as a bad faith actor, deny them engagement/profit.
this is the the crux of the strat. however it only works for discretionary spending category. rent, food etc is hard to avoid but there are still some choices.
vote with that wallet folks, it is the ol' reliable of them all
On August 5, 2024, Trump asked his supporters to stop using Google.
Did not know that. Well. Stopped clock, blind squirrel, etc.
A lot of people still don't know.
Some people don't even know what Reddit is.
Now, Reddit is charging Google for priority access to its posts (article - only Google and Brave will show those results in the near future).
Perhaps Google will start charging money to use it also.
We demand infinite growth. Why? Because shareholders want to buy shares and sell them later for more.
Do anything it takes to make that transaction happen, cut people's jobs en masse, whatever.
Forever.
Stock holders demand infinite growth. If the management doesn't make money, they put in place new management. A company is only worth the value of the next stock buyback or dividend. It's baked into the structure of corporations, especially publicly-owned corporations.
WE don't demand it.
By context "we" refers to google.
Despite the convenience of some of its tools, the hardcore tech set increasingly prefers tech companies like Signal or even Apple, which is currently running expensive TV ads about how other browsers (read: Google's Chrome) spy on you.
One important thing to be mentioned is that, while Apple is correct when highlighting that Chrome is a privacy nightmare, Apple and Google are cut from the same cloth and they're both user-hostile when it comes to privacy, monopoly enforcement, censorship, etc. Both deserve the hate that they get. (Alongside Amazon, Facebook and Microsoft.)
Whats a good google maps alternative?
Ive had some success with OSM+ but only if I supply the end point myself. Otherwise it had a really hard time getting a place like Home Depot or a local university, etc....etc....
In terms of map data, as far as I know there's pretty much only OSM, Google Maps and Apple Maps (which is getting a beta browser version)*.
OSM map data is usually excellent, search can be very hit or miss though. You might want to try some of the apps that use OSM data like Organic Maps to see if you get better search results using that. Personally I use both Apple Maps and Organic Maps.
* I also know of Mapquest but it's lacking a lot of POIs and even ways from what I can see, at least in the two cities I've checked.
Maybe if you're in a big city, or maybe Europe. I recently moved back to the US from Asia and found OSM data to be really bad in the small city that I come from.
Be the change you want to see :)
LOL. a bit late. the story is: how lazy and selfrightious are people using alphabet, apple, microsoft or meta?
i feel they are to an extent of being immature. no matter if you are a majority, that doesnt make things right.
for the same reason we hate apple. they put a pencil pusher with no direction other than higher stock price as ceo.
everyone with common sense and the ability to pay attention has hated google for over a decade.
You either die a hero or less be long enough to become the villain.
Google's motto in 2003: "Don't be evil."
They sure let that motto slide.
Wait until you learn of their role in the apartheid and genocide in Palestine
