So, I swapped to SoundCloud from any other platform, because other platfroms suck and on SoundCloud I get more art made by humans rather than corporate slop, or at least that’s my goal. I’m not big on music, so I’m fresh in the platform, but it’s easier for me to find anything new than it was before, and I hate the “same old”.
I also got Droidify to replace the apps I can with non-corporate, as Google started pushing their ads in all the default apps they provide (I wish that was illegal - fuck the fucking ads in the gallery app).
I wanted to delete Linkedin, but I found myself forced to use it, as I am job seeking, and it’s sadly the best platform for job offers (still bad, but job websites are fucking terrible). I wish it had an option to opt out of the social media part.
I moved to Proton, but that was a while ago. Outlook and Gmail suck.
I also swapped to Firefox a while ago after using Vivaldi, because fuck Google.
I am personally not a privacy oriented person, but the way big corpos are moving to major enshittification due to acknowledging own market domination is stark. I also don’t like corpo slop (e.g. music), so I appreciate being able to find man-made art.
And on that topic, I abadonned Google search for Ecosia, because fuck Google’s AI bullshit.
My de-corpoing is a very loosely applied term, as you see.
Oh, and obviously I abadonned Reddit a while ago.
Have left all the big socials and use Mastodon & Hexbear only. Degoogled up to YT which I only watch in duckgoduck browser because my mind breaks from the ads. I really wish there was a real alternative for it for all the craft and politics stuff. Have switched to Firefox, DuckGoDuck and OpenStreetMap. Deleted all my fitness tracker data too and looked up an opensource tracker for my hiking. Email is now Proton. Messaging app has been Telegram for years now.
Stopped buying crap from Amazon, but fell for Temu instead, I am telling myself that is better as it doesn’t fund Israel.
Tried to move away from Spotify and tried Tidal, but that didn’t stick yet.
I have also stopped reading mainstream news as it is all the same warmongering and corpo crap sprinkled with social justice, I have taken my clicks to independent news sites and blogs and local newspapers. I still see all the worst takes on social media, but my mental health is better when I don’t daily look at all the crap they are pushing into the world.
Took all my everyday shopping back to the only big co-operative shop we have, have also used that as my bank for years now. It’s still a big corp, but it is customer owned. Been getting produce from a small local farmers market type deal for years when I can afford it and also sold stuff there myself, but when I can’t we co-op shop.
Stopped paying for all the streaming services like Prime, Netflix etc. Honestly mostly because none of it is all that good anymore to me. I watch our tax paid national brodcaster stuff and read more again. I would go back to torrents if I didn’t do work in a field where anything like that puts me in trouble if I get careless.
Also trying to use things and repair them as long as I can, poverty lessons I am glad I never unlearn. I fixed a broken laptop hinge that you can’t get spare parts for by putting screws through it and it has worked like that for two more years now.
I wish there was a phone choice that was affordable and free from the corpo bs.
Linux I have been meaning to get into, but since my studies are all office365 shenanigans I am still procrastinating on it.
Back in the day when OpenOffice was all I ever used was a mindset I never should have left behind. Same with Firefox which is where I came to Chrome from back when all the tech bros hyped Chrome, oh boy did we listen to tech bros way too much once upon a time.
I was extremely triggered by all the enshittification the other day when a website just announced to me it will now “personalize” my experience with “AI” without real consent. I was told I can opt out whenever I want, but I sure couldn’t easily find that option anywhere. This was a website that most definitely needs no “AI” nor benefits from “AI”, but they are still just doing it because everyone is. It feels like a clown show that we can’t opt out from.
Firefox + uBlock Origin works for me on YT without ads.
Temu is cool. Amazon does shit ton of drop shipping from Asian stores at extortionate prices. Temu makes repairing my apartment affordable.
I think so too. It’s the same stuff that Amazon sells literally, but a lot more affordable and also better delivery options, a lot cheaper. I also prefer the money going to the sellers who make this stuff in China rather than to Amazon, but not sure how fair Temu is to their sellers as they too aren’t all that transparent about it. But looking at the moral panic it is causing in the West I will buy from there if just out of spite. Buying my plant pots straight(er) from the commies does make me feel better, misplaced as that may be.
With Amazon, even if Temu isn’t fair to the sellers, Amazon is doing the same while turning profit for the western oligarchs, so I still 100% think choosing the Chinese services is the morally better choice. It never even crossed my mind to buy plant pots there. But I won’t have housing for much longer, so I’m only buying cleaning and renovation supplies atm to try to get as much deposit back as possible. ^ ^’
Oh and have to say that ditching Google photos and using their totally shitty takeout system with thousands upon thousands of photos to take out was an experience I want for no-one. It also made me a lot more aware of how much data crap I have accumulated sort of mindlessly over the years.
Deleting seven million blurry images, shitty selfies and json.files and sorting the pictures that are actually worth keeping to physical drives and I am forever fixed from littering my phone with photos that just upload somewhere without me thinking about it.
Oh joy I just bought a hard drive to do exactly that
Oh my, much solidarity. But once you get it done, it’s done. It really does affirm the “never again” mindset with cloud services as a bonus.