My journey towards more European, open source, privacy-oriented, and decentralized alternatives

[email protected]

Over the past few months, I embarked on a rewarding digital journey to move away from US big tech and towards more European [EU], open source [FOSS], privacy-oriented [P], and decentralized [D] alternatives.

I'm sharing my experience here in case it can be useful to others, as well as to gather any additional thoughts or suggestions:

Desktop OS: Microsoft Windows 11 --> OpenSUSE Tumbleweed + KDE [EU][FOSS]
Web browser: Google Chrome --> Brave --> Vivaldi --> Mozilla Firefox + Strict privacy settings, uBlock Origin, Privacy Badger, Conset-O-Matic [FOSS][P]
Email: Gmail --> Infomaniak Mail [EU][FOSS]
Calendar: Google Calendar --> Infomaniak Calendar [EU][FOSS] + OneCalendar [EU]
Files: Dropbox --> Infomaniak kDrive [EU][FOSS]
Photos: Google Photos --> Infomaniak kDrive [EU][FOSS]
Notes: Google Keep --> Notesnook [FOSS][P]
Social Media:
- Facebook --> Nothing
- Twitter/X --> Mastodon (mas.to) [EU][FOSS][D]
- Reddit --> Lemmy (lemm.ee) [EU][FOSS][D]
AI Chatbot: OpenAI ChatGPT --> Mistral AI Le Chat [EU]
Videos: Youtube --> Unwatched [EU][FOSS][P]
Podcasts: Apple Podcasts --> Spotify --> Pocket Casts [FOSS]
Translate: Google Translate --> DeepL [EU]
Maps: Google Maps --> Organic Maps [EU][FOSS][P]
Weather: Apple Weather --> YR [EU]
Online payments: PayPal --> Revolut [EU]
Password manager: LastPass --> Mozilla Firefox --> Bitwarden [FOSS][P]
Online shopping: Amazon --> Cdiscount [EU]
Travel booking: Booking.com --> Direct booking

And here's the list of things I couldn't let go of:

Mobile OS: iOS | I have a business iPhone which is also my personal phone
Messaging: WhatsApp | The network effect is too big here: family, friends, local businesses, etc
Streaming services: Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ | These come basically for free with my ISP and are too convenient for the moment (esp. w/ kids)

[email protected]

Librewolf is also quite a good browser
Piefed seems like it’s shaping up to be better than Lemmy in a few different ways and it’s compatible with all the Lemmy people

[email protected]

Librewolf seems to be a bit too extreme for my taste, not to mention I’d like to have the same browser on desktop and mobile. I also feel like Mozilla is a company worth supporting, despite the recent mess ups.

Very curious about piefed - looking forward to a mobile app in the near future hopefully!

[email protected]

I would also recommend the chatbot HuggingChat, it uses open weights models

[email protected]

Use a seedbox and the arrr suite instead of streaming services

[email protected]

+1 for Librewolf...

[email protected]

Librewolf is a fork of Firefox. You can even still have a Mozilla account with it. Meaning, you can sync Firefox on mobile to Librewolf on PC.

I usually have a lot of tabs open on PC, at all times. I use FF for anything where they already have all, or a significant amount of, my details (full name, address, &/or credit card, etc.), like Amazon, banking, Proton & Tuta email and calendar, etc. I use Librewolf for other websites where I need to login, but I want more privacy / even less tracking than FF. I occasionally even use Mullvad browser (another FF fork) as well.

[email protected]

The alternative to Netflix Amazon and Disney im using now (also kid friendly) is DVDs. Either bought used or self-burnt.

[email protected]

@ceiron
I have to disagree here.

Social Media:
- Facebook --> Nothing
- Twitter/X --> Mastodon (mas.to) [EU][FOSS]

As a replacement for Facebook, Instagram, X/Twitter and YouTube, there are many options in #Fediverse.
For example:
Facebook -> #Friendica, #Hubzilla, #Streams
Instagram -> #Pixelfed
X -> #GoToSocial, #Pleroma, #Misskey, #Firefish, #Mastodon,
Youtube -> #Peertube
Blogging -> #Wordpress, #WriteFreely, #Bookwyrm, #Ghost

With #FediDB you can find any Instance that meet your requirements

[email protected]

Right, I’m aware of the many Fediverse alternatives and services.

What I meant to say is that I have decided to quit Facebook and not replace it because I don’t feel a need that particular type of social media - Mastodon and Lemmy cover my needs well enough.

As for YouTube, the channels I’m interested in are just not on Peertube so I opted for a privacy-oriented version of YouTube which allows me to follow my channels without a Google account, ads or recommendation algorithms.

[email protected]

Yr is Norwegian and great for some places, but often mistaken re amount of rain in other places — here in Switzerland, eg, meteosuisse is much better.

[email protected]

The problem I have is that I travel frequently across countries so I do need a single app that is reliable enough across Central Europe. Meteoswiss is great but doesn’t cover the neighbouring countries.

[email protected]

Very curious about piefed - looking forward to a mobile app in the near future hopefully!

I really like it on desktop. On default front end, it clicked the easiest. Though for lemmy I still prefer Tesseract, but all the other inherent features that's not on lemmy, especially comments consolidation for same link, just trounces lemmy for me.

The android app Interstellar is testing piefed support, although currently only allows preferred.social instance IIRC. I registered on the flagship piefed.social instance, and I'm a bit too lived in on it to change instance. Maybe it's better to see if I can migrate my account.

[email protected]

We just put some of these privacy alternatives on a map: https://www.rebeltechalliance.org/stopusingbigtech.html (scroll down)

What's missing is anything truly FOSS with no fixed country of origin, but it's still fun to see how some of the main players spread out.

Enjoy!

[email protected]

Yes, true… I’ve heard people in several countries say yr is their preferred service, so it must be quite good in general.

[email protected]

DVDs have atrocious quality. Blu rays are where it's at

[email protected]

Maybe from a technical point of view, but if you have a 1080 screen or lower, from a couch distance you cannot see any deficiencies in quality. I have a 4k tv and my player upscales the footage. I cannot complain whatsoever.

[email protected]

Couch distance and especially screen size can vary a lot. I can clearly see the difference between full HD and whatever resolution DVDs have at the 2~3 meter distance at my parents'. (43" full HD screen). Same goes for 4K vs full HD on my 60" screen.

In any case, my main point was that DVDs are no viable alternative to streaming services since all of them offer much better quality. If you really want to replace streaming services at similar or better quality, go for Blu rays.

[email protected]

Try /e/OS, i think you will love it and find the UI to be surprisingly much like IOS! www.e.foundation

[email protected]

On my radar but I only have an iPhone (provided by my company) so pretty limited in what I can do with it (and not keen on having 2 phones)

NodeBB

My journey towards more European, open source, privacy-oriented, and decentralized alternatives