Will I ever be able to stop using my google account?

I created my google account all the way back in 2014.

I came to know about how mega companies like Meta, Google and Microsoft track every single thing that you do and how they violate your privacy. I watched a lot of videos from Youtube channels such as Techlore and The Hated One.

This all happened in 2020 during the lockdown.

I deleted my instagram account, created a Tutanota and Protonmail account and started to use front-ends for sites like YouTube and Reddit.

But four years later, I still haven’t been able to stop using my google account. I had made a decision to slowly migrate from my Google account but that never happened.

So why haven’t I switched?

The answer is simple. It is because of all the apps and services provided by Google are free, easy and convenient to use.

I am also kind of lazy to do it because the whole switching process doesn’t happen with the snap of a finger.

I backup my data on my phone to google drive, store documents and other files in drive, edit documents on Google Docs and store photos on google photos.

But we all know when you are not paying for it, you are the product.

Many of you reading this will probably want to ask me ‘Why not just self-host?’

I would really love to self host apps like NextCloud but I just don’t have the money to set up a server.

Buying a rasberry pi in India is expensive and I would also have to spend more money on storage.

Yes, there are free third-party instances of Nextcloud and free cloud storage providers like Mega. But I don’t want to use those. If I am going to switch, I want to use software which I have control over.

Final thoughts

I am just going to keep using my Google account for now(I don’t really have any other option). But in the future when I have the money, I will definetly switch to self hosted appplications. It is something that I am very eager to use.

This is day 22 of #100DaystoOffload