this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2025
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Privacy

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Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

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I created an infographic of privacy-forward alternatives to Google products...and would love your feedback.

Is it easy to use? Enough white space? Intuitive? Sharable? Is there anything I'm missing?

The infographic image in this post is NOT clickable. The link above will give you a downloadable PDF with working hyperlinks.

Re: the legend, "easy set-up/use" means either that this is a big part of the alternative product's branding, or I've used it myself and found it easy.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Not listing Organic Maps is a travesty. Possibly mention Immich, though I see you're going more for SaaS and not really self hosted

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yes, this is definitely more for beginners (like myself. :) I will check out Organic Maps and maybe add them in, thanks!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

If you try Organic Maps yourself, try using Sherpa Onnx TTS with it. It's a great open source match and really makes the experience of navigation top tier

https://k2-fsa.github.io/sherpa/onnx/tts/apk-engine.html

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

Organic Maps and OpenStreetMap should be listed as map alternatives. Mullvad Leta is a recently popular private search engine.

Google isn't inherently bad; they are bad for privacy but good for security. For that reason, Chromium-based browsers such as Vanadium, Trivalent, or Brave Browser are still good alternatives to Google Chrome even though Chromium (which is the open source base for Chromium-based browsers) is developed by Google.

Also: the "T" in PeerTube should be capitalized.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Thank you, thank you, thank you! If there was one browser from my list you'd replace with Vanadium, which would it be?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Epic, only because I've never heard of it so it probably isn't recommended often. I should note that Vanadium is only available on Android and is very difficult to install if you don't use GrapheneOS. Trivalent is only available for a small subset of Linux distros (and comes preinstalled on secureblue). Brave Browser is cross-platform and recommended by GrapheneOS as an alternative to Vanadium if you want specific features Vanadium lacks.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

Thanks! Oh yes, I knew that...I use GrapheneOS myself. I'll check these others out.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

What kind of security is google good for?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Chromium, as I mentioned, as well as the Android Open Source Project used as the base for GrapheneOS. Their hardware is also very secure, which is why it is used by GrapheneOS. Google Play Store is also one of the most secure app stores for Android, but one of the least private. This is where Google becomes a double edged sword.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Open source licensing, offline-only usability, and self-hostable are the only important criteria to me, and they are not listed here.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

Yes, I'd say this is for beginners—say, my mom—who are heavily in the Google ecosystem and don't know how to get out. Maybe I should change the focus away from privacy, since Google has many other issues besides privacy that made me leave.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago

nah With all respect, as a proton user, proton docs sucks ass. but that may change in the future

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

Maybe after this!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Nextcloud replaces Photo's, Drive and docs.

And more

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Isn't Grayjay a frontend for YouTube?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

It is. Same as NewPipe but they are using different extraction methods I think.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Aha! Yes, it is. Any suggestions for non-YouTube video platforms?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Maybe Peertube or Odyssey.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

It's contacts syncing that I'm stuck on. Hoping to do something with a box running OMV but I've never come across anything so simple as Google Contacts 😔

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Why could this not just be a webpage with links instead of an image or PDF

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

Because I like infographics. :) I'll be putting it on my website.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Y'all should probably stop mentioning proton

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (2 children)

As someone who wants to drop Proton VPN and has stopped using their mail in favor of mailbox.org, I think we should still mention them, just with an asterisk. People deserve to make their own choice about if they wish to support him or not. At least it's non-profit now.

I really wanna stop using the VPN and go to Mullvad (since they've proved they have no logs), but they don't offer port forwarding anymore, and the only other option is AirVPN, which had a server seizure in 2015 that they didn't want to disclose until like 2023... (gag order?)

I don't torrent often, but I do occasionally...

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago

If you dont torrent often you probably arent really needing port forwarding. I use mullvad and i torrent things all the time with zero issues.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (2 children)

How is mailbox? I just recently got proton set up with my custom domain and I kind of like it to be honest and their app is nice too.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The owner of Proton is publicly a Trump supporter. Never trust a company that publicly supports Trump (e.g. Proton, StickerMule, etc.)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Honest question, do you think Gail Slater was a good or bad choice?

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

I know there has been some political controversy around them lately, and that for email Tuta is recommended over Proton Mail—I do mention both of these facts in DISENGAGE: Opting Out—and Finding New Options—to Reclaim Your Life from Spammers, Scammers, Intrusive Marketers and Big Tech, which I'm trying to promote through the infographic. But overall I've been happy with Proton's suite of products as compared to the relevant Google products.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I see Ground News recommended all the time but for some reason i cannot trust it, idk why

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

I mean it's heavily advertised by YouTubers. And basically everything that sponsors YouTube videos is a scam.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The capitalization for OsmAnd should be corrected. Please?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

Of course! Thanks!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (2 children)

For news I would advice using the newstool MiniFlux.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Since you included decentralized solutions like Peertube, maybe add SearXNG instances for searches ?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Hmm...Peertube was so easy for me to search and use—I think a lot of people wouldn't even know it's decentralized—but the SearXNG website is much more complicated. I'm looking for non-Google products that are easy for the average, non-tech person. Think SearXNG would work?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

As a software dev... im still too stupid to use searxng. Guess its more of a "If its not that easy I wont go further learning it".

Maybe it was a lot of features missing that I missed from Duckduckgo.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

OK, I'm glad it's not just me. :D

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