Breaking Free from Big Tech
Breaking Free from Big Tech
After years on standard Android with Google services running the show, I took the plunge: GrapheneOS on a Pixel 9a as my daily driver. Here’s what I learned in the first week. The Setup: Jolla Devices Delivered I ordered my Pixel 9a with GrapheneOS pre-installed from Jolla Devices. I can’t recommend them enough. Fast service, […]
If there’s one Google service that truly deserves its dominance, it’s search. Google didn’t become a verb by accident—they genuinely built the best search engine on the planet. And that makes leaving it one of the hardest parts of this entire project. Google Is (Was) Search For most of us, “searching the internet” means “Googling […]
Not everything in this project is within my control. I can choose my personal email provider, my desktop operating system, and my cloud storage solution. But I can’t choose what my employer mandates for work communication. That means Microsoft stays. Outlook for email. Teams for communication. OneDrive and SharePoint for document storage. Office 365 for […]
After spending considerable time with Brave Browser on Windows, I’ve made the decision to switch to LibreWolf as my primary browser. Here’s why, and how I’m managing the transition. The Decision to Switch I’ve been a Brave user for a while now, and I won’t deny that the Chromium engine has its advantages—it’s fast, widely […]
This is a list of services I need to replace as I leave the Google ecosystem and broader big tech. For each one, I’ll explain what I’m currently using, what I’m switching to, and why I made that choice. Consider this a roadmap. I’ll dive deeper into each service migration in dedicated posts down the […]
This project isn’t driven by a single reason or a blanket hatred of technology companies. Each of the big tech giants—Google, Microsoft, and Meta—presents its own set of concerns that, taken together, make staying in their ecosystems untenable for me. Google: The Best Product, The Worst Privacy Let me be clear: Google still has the […]
For over a decade, I was all-in on Google. Not just as a casual user, but as an enthusiast. I built my entire digital life on their infrastructure: Gmail at the core, surrounded by Drive, Photos, Calendar, and the rest of the ecosystem. I recommended Google Workspace to friends, colleagues, and clients without hesitation. The […]