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Trying to get away from Google

addermc

addermc

Member
Okay, I'm trying to get away from using Google for everything. Already using Mint browser and downloader app and Yandex browser app as secondary browser (great if it would automatically translate to English). Now looking for a different app for photos,launcher and anything else to change from using Google, specially Gmail. Main question is, since I'm trying not to use google apps,do I still need to keep updating the apps (google, chrome, Gmail,etc).
 
You don't have to update apps you don't use, though unless you disable them your update list in the Play Store will be cluttered up with the things (for the record I have all 3 that you name explicitly, Google, Chrome and GMail, disabled).

Gallery apps are easy, unless you have specific requirements (e.g. cloud backup is a feature of Photos, but I assume that if you do want that you don't want it to back up to Google's cloud). F-Stop and Simple Gallery are 2 that I have, but there are plenty of others. Don't know that Yandex would be top of my trust list, but again there are plenty of browsers to choose from. Any number of launchers (I'm a long-term Nova user), and also plenty of email clients (I currently have Nine, paid, and FairEmail installed on my device).

If you want to go further you can try getting your apps from F-Droid rather than the Play Store. Plenty of apps there, including some of those I've named, though not all have the polish of some of the big names in Google Play.
 
Depends: iPhones are very inflexible, with no alternative to the App Store and a UI straight out of a '90s PDA. And iPhones and their apps do plenty of activity tracking too.

I'd say if you really want to go Google-free buy a rootable phone, stick an AOSP ROM on it with no Google apps (e.g. Lineage and don't install the Gapps package), and then be careful what else you install.
 
Hadron said:
You don't have to update apps you don't use, though unless you disable them your update list in the Play Store will be cluttered up with the things (for the record I have all 3 that you name explicitly, Google, Chrome and GMail, disabled).

Gallery apps are easy, unless you have specific requirements (e.g. cloud backup is a feature of Photos, but I assume that if you do want that you don't want it to back up to Google's cloud). F-Stop and Simple Gallery are 2 that I have, but there are plenty of others. Don't know that Yandex would be top of my trust list, but again there are plenty of browsers to choose from. Any number of launchers (I'm a long-term Nova user), and also plenty of email clients (I currently have Nine, paid, and FairEmail installed on my device).

If you want to go further you can try getting your apps from F-Droid rather than the Play Store. Plenty of apps there, including some of those I've named, though not all have the polish of some of the big names in Google Play.
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Thanks for the quick response. One thing that I'm not sure of (actually there's more than one,but numbers don't go that high) is emails. I've never even seen another email besides one's ending with gmail.com,Yahoo.com or yandex.com I can't figure out how to even start with email besides Gmail. And googles photos automatically gets everything I due with phone (ZTE Max Android). Also I stopped backing up Anything to google or Drive months ago. Can any other photos app due like googles? Last question, Yandex browser, give me the 411 about it please. I mainly like the image search in it and cause it's Not google, Right?
 
svim said:
There are plenty of alternatives to Google services, a few listed here:
https://www.techspot.com/news/80729-complete-list-alternatives-all-google-products.html
but really, instead of using an Android device if you really want to detach yourself from Google oversight you should get an iPhone.
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Thanks for the link going to it just as soon as this lazy ass nurse hooks me up for chemo. Also I'm trying to get away from Google but as far as iphone goes I traded my thirteen yr old daughter my two weeks old Brand New iPhone 10 for her ZTE Max. Best thing I've done in a long time. Also,how would I get it away from her?
 
There are a large number of email providers out there. The truly privacy conscious could consider something like protonmail, though the free service there has a not too large storage quota (I have a protonmail account I use for stuff I want to be a bit more secure). If you don't mind another big corporation then Outlook is an easy option with good storage options - of course that's just swapping Google for Microsoft, but it isn't Google (and, amazingly, MS have been pushing for better privacy protections, something that it's hard to imagine Google doing). An article I read recently suggested that the Germany-based GMX.com could be a candidate (free, ad-supported, huge mailbox capacity) but I've no experience with them. But there are many options out there.

What features do you actually want in a gallery app?
 
Re Yandex, if you are trying to keep your data from the NSA they are probably a good option. If you are trying to keep them from the FSB, not so much.

They are more willing to sell data to third party advertisers, while Google prefer to act as a middle man (i.e. those people pay Google for Google to use your data oon their behalf).
 
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One other comment on email: I was talking about services, but you don't have to use the email provider's app. For example I use Nine for my Outlook email rather than the Outlook app, and have over the years used many different apps for GMail (Maildroid, Aquamail, Nine, K9, FairEmail, probably others) but never the GMail app (I tried it in 2010, decided there were better apps, never used it again). The only one where I use the provider's app is Protonmail.
 
Who's your ISP, addermc? Mine is Earthlink, and I've used its e-mail forever. [I recently posted about possibly giving up my 25-year-old, private, only given to close family/friends, Earthlink address.] But I never use its web-based mail, nor do I use any Google product for reading my Gmail.

On my computers, which are all Linux, I've used SeaMonkey's e-mail/newsgroup client since its genesis as part of Netscape Communicator. On my Android devices, I use FairEmail Pro (paid).

With both of those, I choose to download everything, automatically, to my computers/devices; this includes Gmail. No one but Google knows/uses it. (Google sends me receipts when I buy apps, and occasional TOS updates.). So none of my mail is stored on anyone's servers, just my hard drives.

Both of those apps support simultaneous, multiple account management. In other words, with SeaMonkey, for example, I can see all of my e-mail accounts at once, and see at a glance which have new mail; I can pick any account's inbox, sent mail, etc., or compose a new message from any of them effortlessly.

Assuming you have an Internet connection at home, you should have at least one e-mail account available to you from its provider. By using a mail client, you can choose whether to leave messages on your ISP's servers and/or download them.

Regarding photos, you can either transfer them yourself to a computer/thumb drive/whatever, and/or you can use a service like Dropbox and set it up to automatically sync your photos [and all other files, if you want]. If you're an Amazon Prime member, you have unlimited photo storage via Amazon Photos, which can also automatically upload if you want. [I think you can buy storage if you're not Prime.]
 
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