Today I tried to remove all my data from the various google services I had been using over the last couple years and leave the data monster. Biggest effort was to delete all the contacts in my address book. There were around 900 and you can only delete 20 at a time. I also found google docs from like 2 years ago. Really scary. My web history showed around 1500 search querys a month for the last year. I don’t like being profiled like that.
From now on I keep whatever I can on my own server. That inclueds webhosting, email, bookmarks and openid. Works better than expected so far and gives you lots of flexibility. The only thing I couldn’t substitute so far is google reader. There is an opensource rss reader, you can install on your server, but it’s not really what I’m looking for. For the moment I’m at bloglines, which I find pretty nice.
I’m not sure if the whole thing was worth the effort, but if things on the internet continue to move in the direction we’re moving now, it’s gonna be nasty.
I encourage everyone to make a similar move and try to reduce it’s data footprint. Here are some practical advises:
- RSS Reader: This was my main issue, why I decided to stick with google for such a long time. Try Bloglines Beta. They have similar features and accept OpenID.
- E-Mail: Lavabit offers fully encrypted, free E-Mails with a strong focus on privacy.
I just finished reading a really great book, you probably haven’t heard about yet. It’s by Timothy Brook and deals with the upcoming issue of globalization and all its various aspects.
