A couple of years ago i decided to get as far away from facebook and google services as possible.
For facebook, i uninstalled all of their apps. Including instagram and whatsapp when they aquired those startups. I do still have a facebook account, however i only log in when i get an email that some friend writes to me on facebook. This does not happen a lot anymore as they know i have moved elsewhere or get annoyed by my long response times.
For google, i have left behind gmail and their search engine. Unfortunately i am still a user of both an android phone and google maps since they are sitting on a duopoly with apple on android auto/apple carplay. F*ckers…
For anything else i look for open source solutions or “honest” businesses to run the services i need.
For email i went with Protonmail and has been with them for the last two years. However i’m getting fed up with not having smtp/imap access which forces me to their own clients. My subscription is coming to an end and i am seriously looking at migadu.com for hosting. Albeit expensive, they seem honest and will treat me as a customer and not a user.
My code hosting is currently hosted at sourcehut.org which is a bootstrapped small shop that has strong opinions. It’s open source and again i am quite certain that i am not being sold. I have not found out whether i’m donating to them or if i am actually a customer though. Anyways. It’s open source and i could choose to self host if need be.
I currently have to VPS, one at Upcloud and one at openbsd.amsterdam. Upcloud does seem like a regular startup which i do dislike. But they are based in helsinki which gives me some relief. openbsd.amsterdam on the other hand is very genuine guys. Again it’s a small shop that delivers a service and donates to the openbsd foundation on the same time.
In all, i’m sick of startups. I am sick of businesses that only have growth in mind and in so many cases treat people that pay for a service for “paying users” and not genuine customers.
For me Users are people who are being abused one way or another. There is a reason drug addicts are also called users and not customers…
This ended up like one big rant about the startups and big tech. It’s rotten and unfortunately normal businesses are starting to adobt all these rotten business practices.
I just want to be a genuine customer at a genuine business. And i do not mind paying for a service if i am treated as a genuine customer.
Do not track me. Do not sell me. Do not collect more data on me than you need to. Do not make me a user.
It’s not that difficult.