Vivaldi is my main browser (Can use Chrome add-ons, has good ad blocking), with WaterFox being my secondary (originally derived from FireFox). I use Thunderbird for email, calendar and tasks, with my emails either coming from my domains (and administered through my hosting sites), or my ancient - has been bought out and traded several times - originally from Southwestern Bell.
DDG - never seems to have good search to me. Nor Brave (Have also heard bad things about Brave, Bing, Firefox and such, especially After 2020 - but I could have just been hearing rumors.) Dogpile if it's still around is pretty much useless for search. There is StartPage, don't know who it is through, but it comes with Vivaldi. Yahoo is also useless for search.
I use Libre for docs, have tried OpenOffice - which is bloated and slow and MSTech office, which looks like MS, but it is also pretty slow and missing some needed items (or at least I haven't figure out how to get them.) I used to have a standalone of Word 93, which worked great, but with computer migration, I have lost that.
StartPage “anonymous view” was good for getting past a paywall for a website that you would ordinarily never visit, but just wanted to read one article and didn’t want to pay for a lengthy subscription you’ll never use. But that hardly ever works anymore because most of these sites have instituted code that blocks that ability. DDG is my goto almost exclusively.
Being somewhat technically illiterate myself, as many people are, a lot of the solutions to completely rid myself of Google’s tentacles is beyond my ken and in some cases, my wallet. But I have been successful in finding good alternatives for my browser, search engine and email. I’m still trying to end my YouTube habit (meep).
I use Brave or Firefox for most of my browsing. There are a couple of things at work I have to use Chrome or Edge for. I use Brave for my search engine except for maps, or when on my iPad. The more I use Brave for searches the better it seems to get for me. I even use the Brave browser on my iPad.
We have access to O365 through work, but I find it very slow and only use it for work emails. We have an old MS Office Suite that I bought over a decade ago that I've been able to keep alive across a couple of different computer migrations.
I have Proton Mail, but don't use it for much. We use the MS app at work, and I use the browser to access MSN (home-family) and Yahoo! (home-personal) for most of my email.
I don't care for online banking or bill paying, so I'm still sending out physical checks through the USPS.
Yandex is one I use a lot when I want fine-grained primary-source information rather than curated wokery. Do I trust it to give me accurate information about Putin or the Ukraine? No. But who cares? It is like Google in the good old days for everything else.
I like the Opera browser. Also based on Chromium, but with some nice extra features. Also excellent cross platform support. Currently using it on Ubuntu Gnome. Firefox is my alternative browser.
Beyond that I use Thunderbird for mail, and Protonmail for webmail. Brave search. Rumble & Odysse for videos. LibreOffice for Word processing & spreadsheet. OpenAI instead of Gemini, until something better comes along. Thepiratebay + Plex for my own streaming service.
There's add-ons to help avoid Google, too-- I got Ignore Google Scripts.
It is *interesting* how many sites won't work until I unblock it long enough for the verification to load.
https://microsoftedge.microsoft.com/addons/detail/ignore-google-scripts/mdigdmlddpfddbkbknpbmpeilipnklki
What you need to do is always block a critical half dozen:
google-analytics.com
googleadservices.com
googletagservices.com
www.google-analytics.com
www.googleadservices.com
www.googletagservices.com
Many of the rest are needed to make things work
Vivaldi is my main browser (Can use Chrome add-ons, has good ad blocking), with WaterFox being my secondary (originally derived from FireFox). I use Thunderbird for email, calendar and tasks, with my emails either coming from my domains (and administered through my hosting sites), or my ancient - has been bought out and traded several times - originally from Southwestern Bell.
DDG - never seems to have good search to me. Nor Brave (Have also heard bad things about Brave, Bing, Firefox and such, especially After 2020 - but I could have just been hearing rumors.) Dogpile if it's still around is pretty much useless for search. There is StartPage, don't know who it is through, but it comes with Vivaldi. Yahoo is also useless for search.
I use Libre for docs, have tried OpenOffice - which is bloated and slow and MSTech office, which looks like MS, but it is also pretty slow and missing some needed items (or at least I haven't figure out how to get them.) I used to have a standalone of Word 93, which worked great, but with computer migration, I have lost that.
StartPage “anonymous view” was good for getting past a paywall for a website that you would ordinarily never visit, but just wanted to read one article and didn’t want to pay for a lengthy subscription you’ll never use. But that hardly ever works anymore because most of these sites have instituted code that blocks that ability. DDG is my goto almost exclusively.
Being somewhat technically illiterate myself, as many people are, a lot of the solutions to completely rid myself of Google’s tentacles is beyond my ken and in some cases, my wallet. But I have been successful in finding good alternatives for my browser, search engine and email. I’m still trying to end my YouTube habit (meep).
I use Brave or Firefox for most of my browsing. There are a couple of things at work I have to use Chrome or Edge for. I use Brave for my search engine except for maps, or when on my iPad. The more I use Brave for searches the better it seems to get for me. I even use the Brave browser on my iPad.
We have access to O365 through work, but I find it very slow and only use it for work emails. We have an old MS Office Suite that I bought over a decade ago that I've been able to keep alive across a couple of different computer migrations.
I have Proton Mail, but don't use it for much. We use the MS app at work, and I use the browser to access MSN (home-family) and Yahoo! (home-personal) for most of my email.
I don't care for online banking or bill paying, so I'm still sending out physical checks through the USPS.
clarification: I'll use Apple maps when on my iPad, and use Brave Search through the Brave browser on my iPad.
Yandex is one I use a lot when I want fine-grained primary-source information rather than curated wokery. Do I trust it to give me accurate information about Putin or the Ukraine? No. But who cares? It is like Google in the good old days for everything else.
Presearch.com
Hey !!! That photo is reversed !!!!!
Can't air brush out the "Don't" in the original version
Wow ... OK, I missed that !
I still have my Yahoo! email from the 1990s.
I like the Opera browser. Also based on Chromium, but with some nice extra features. Also excellent cross platform support. Currently using it on Ubuntu Gnome. Firefox is my alternative browser.
Beyond that I use Thunderbird for mail, and Protonmail for webmail. Brave search. Rumble & Odysse for videos. LibreOffice for Word processing & spreadsheet. OpenAI instead of Gemini, until something better comes along. Thepiratebay + Plex for my own streaming service.