Gronk@aussie.zone 1 week ago
Migrated away from Google because they’re just genuinely useless.
Search results are infested with AI bullshit and SEO slop, can’t actually search for anything useful unless you know the website you’re looking for, in which case I just go to the website directly.
Youtube curates a selection of completely irrelevant videos to try to shove ads down your throat, I still have to change my user agent string every time because YouTube throws a hissy fit at firefox with ublock.
Gmail is pretty much the same as any other email provider but comes at the expense of your data being sold for advertising purposes.
Don’t even get me started on the shit show that is Android.
I run GrapheneOS, Fedora and debian, self host what I can and use decent providers for what I can’t. I’m the furthest away from the big tech corps than I’ve ever been and it feels great to have computers that actually compute and not serve me useless fucking ad drivel.
Are you me? It sounds like you’re me, but ahead of the journey.
Already on Graphene and Linux (openSUSE in my case) and considering starting to self-host myself.
I think in the short term this is the only solution to escape the garbage that the internet has become.
on my ironfox mobile browser, i could not use google, because i dont know how to get around thier recaptcha, it was asking everytime i opened the browser, so i just use duckduck go instead.
setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world 1 week ago
I have a Google account specifically for logging into YouTube. I’ve aggressively used the like/hide channel/not interested in this video options to force it to actually show me what I want. It took quite a while to train it, but my YouTube homepage is actually nice right now.
But every so often I’ll go on YouTube logged out and it’s like staring into the sun. The top videos that it pushes seem like brain melting garbage.
Strangely I haven’t had any issues with Firefox+Ublock+Sponsorblock. The way YouTube interacts with seemingly the same sets of software for different people is baffling.
zerofk@lemm.ee 1 week ago
I’ve gone the opposite route. I never log in, and remove all cookies. I almost always use an incognito tab for YouTube. I’m a new visitor to them every time, in as much as that’s possible. I use bookmarks to go back to creators I want to see, and occasionally check them. No subscriptions either, which may suck for the creator, but at least they get my views.
setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world 1 week ago
I like the convenience of being shown all my subscriptions, and with a trained algorithm actually being shown suggestions I’d be interested in. I think with an account used just for YouTube and nothing else the value to Google is minimal. It’s the last thing I have left from de-googling everywhere else.
Ledericas@lemm.ee 1 week ago
i dont log into to youtube most of the time, just draws unnessary attention, from other users.
setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Can you elaborate? Using a compartmentalized account just to watch videos seems it shouldn’t draw any attention unless you’re getting into fights in the comments.