breaking up (with) big tech
This is not necessarily how I wanted to jump back into the land of blogging, but here we are. I’ve been negligent with this blog in favor of social media, but I’ve been blogging in some capacity since middle school. From chaotically building many GeoCities websites with visitor counters (analytics, hello?) to fibbing about my age to get a MySpace (sorry, Mom) to Livejournal to Blogspot to Tumblr to all the social media platforms now, it’s evident I’ve been chronically online for well over 25 years.
That said, with the takeover of tech oligarchs, I, for once, am thinking about what it means to have an online presence, where my data lives, and how I (over)consume content. I understand there are no perfect solutions and acknowledge we’ve gone down a path of unregulated social media, as well as – and very importantly! – data tracking and AI. I am also not an expert. Being too online for decades does not qualify me for much, so the following are some of the ways I’m shifting gears.
The following is primarily written with the goal of leaving Meta apps. I’ve been noticing their apps getting significantly worse for a long time, and that seems to have accelerated. Mark Zuckerberg is garbage. There are also a lot of other garbage billionaires, including one taking over the government, so there are some added alternatives.
Here are a few approaches to how I’m shifting gears. First, I’m swapping out social media:
In: Bluesky
Out: X, Threads
Out: Instagram
In: Reelo (TBD), Rednote (check app stores)
Out: TikTok
Alternatives for other things:
In: Craigslist (embrace tradition), Buy Nothing app, Offerup
Out: Facebook Marketplace
And then I am working to swap out:
In: Signal
Out: Texting
In: Proton Mail
Out: Gmail, etc.
In: DuckDuckGo / Firefox with DuckDuckGo extension
Out: Google, Chrome
Other things:
Using an RSS feed reader again! We’re back to blogs, baby. I’m using Inoreader.
Support your favorite content creators on Patreon. (Substack has a track record with Nazis on their platform.)
Adding a VPN (TBD)
Here are other resources around downloading data + disabling data tracking (as best as possible):
Downloading Meta data (2 links)
Removing data tracking on Meta (I recommend watching the TikTok video)
This is by no means a comprehensive list of everything, but maybe it can start as a jumping off point if you’re interested in making changes. And if you’re not? That’s OK! I know that for some, these platforms are a lifeline of community and livelihood (Hello, small businesses, non-profits, and advocacy groups!) My hope is there is enough hunger for change that new platforms appear where we can rebuild (and many so far seem to be open source.) And there are plenty of us who can take away our money and our data.
Stay safe/sane, friends.