Leaving Google has actively improved my life

Not a fan of Google but I always find Gmail criticisms so weird.

Like, what does this guy even mean about the algorithm sorting his inbox? Legit what the fuck is he talking about? Non junk mail goes to my inbox. Spam goes to spam. What am I missing?

And speaking of spam, I have a bunch of proton mail accounts and outlook accounts and iCloud mail accounts and Gmail’s spam filter is easily the best. Like, it’s not even close. Protonmail is nearly as bad as outlook at dealing with spam. It’s impossible to overstate how bad both of them are at filtering spam vs Gmail.

I legit feel like I’m either being actively gaslit or I’m genuinely missing something big here.

As for search alternatives, I’d love to use Kagi full time but the cost is just unreasonably high for now IMO.

"conscience," not "conscious."

Kagi, Fastmail, Immich, LibreOffice are all excellent alternatives to Google Garbage.

I saw someone on Safari having to actually watch YouTube ads.

It was so bizarre! I forgot those even exist.

Pro tip: Gemini Flash is the new Google. Bypasses all the SEO and ad garbage.

Also I still haven't found anything that replaces Google for finding local, physical businesses.

And Gmail? I have it mainly to give to random businesses. I like Hey.com more but I don't want the utility company or some online service I barely care about cluttering it up.

Also there is no YouTube equivalent. They pay creators the most so creators are all on YouTube.

These types of articles always remind of conspiracy theorists. Being so excited to view something in a new way, to degradate something popular, to view themselves as unique individuals and in control again. That they are outside the mainstream and that is superior because they have the secret knowledge.

Also the "if something is free you are the product" is so obviously false if you think about it for a minute. A lot of people pay for Amazon Prime, yet they are still the product. Just because you had a company money does not mean they will won't maximize profit by monetizing your information. Not to mention Blender is free. Are they the product as well? It's just a saying with good mouth feel and nothing else. Definitely not something anyone should change their life around for.

Some of this is... pretty tortured:

> Leaving Gmail also gave me the opportunity to start implementing better digital hygiene.

Which is to say, everyone else's spam filtering is awful, so you need to restrict access to your email so they don't fill your inbox.

This is literally the same logic that says we shouldn't vaccinate women against HPV because then they won't learn to practice abstinence.

[dead]

> My conscious is a tiny bit cleaner

I think he meant my conscience.

Used to think Google was awesome when they were hyper accurate, fast, and not enshittifying products.

Now I am convinced they are just a little bit better than Meta.