The reason I'll never pay Google a subscription fee is because they still spy on you and make money off your data even if you pay them.
The deal is supposed to be either:
OR
Any service that doesn't fall into one of those two categories can GTFO.
NFC pay is not ubiquitous enough in my area so I use a phone case that has room for cards. I still need to carry a physical health insurance card and a physical ID as well so my wallet case is not going away. I actually bought a pixel 9 instead of 10 just because my favorite wallet case was available.
I'm considering just getting a Garmin watch that I keep disconnected from my phone to use for NFC pay. Seems like I would be able to set up my cards in Garmin Pay app and then just disconnect it.
It doesn't even need to be in the store, just let me order one online and check off a "GrapheneOS" box, the same way that I can order a Framework laptop with either Windows or Linux.
But I get your point, I can see how someone could get confused when their phone arrived and required some extra tinkering to get Google stuff to work.
Wouldn't it be better if it DID? Wouldn't that get around all the "tamper" detection stuff?
Right now I have Google Play disabled in my owner profile, but it would be nice if apps in secondary profiles could pass the full Play Integrity checks... even though I'm actively trying to transition away from them.
For example Cisco DUO says my device with GrapheneOS installed has been tampered with, and I was hoping that would go away if I could just buy the phone with GrapheneOS installed.
Thanks for the tips. Amazon/Alexa/Ring are next on my list after the de-Google.
Fastmail seems like it's worth a try. Privacy from data brokers and ad companies is my main goal so Fastmail gets a green check mark there. It doesn't seem like they claim E2EE but they do claim encryption.
I guess I was thinking Proton because the E2EE "we can't even see your data" claim is appealing in an age where corporations are hungry for data to train their AI models.
I am also interested in the bundled VPN with Proton, but yeah the price is a little off-putting and it seems like it is going up.
Been meaning to check out Librewolf, but Vanadium has been pretty good so far.
I've been using it for almost a month and I'm a big fan. I was planning to wait for the Motorola phone but my screen on my old phone was rapidly becoming unusable.
I'm using it to divorce Big Tech. I created two secondary profiles, one for work and one for Big Tech. The Big Tech profile is where I'll enable Google services and permissions. I don't let it run in the background so once I switch back its like I turned off Big Tech. I can still use all the apps and services I'm used to, but I added enough friction that it's causing me to explore alternatives every day.
My owner profile has Play and Play Services totally disabled. I get push notifications for Signal using Sunup for UnifiedPush. I get apps mostly through Accressent, Obtainium, and Aurora. If apps complain about missing Google services too much, they get relegated to the Big Tech profile while I find an alternative. Most of the apps that complain about it (like Ring) still work fine. Most of the "apps" I use are just PWAs that run in Vanadium and have icons on the home screen.
The biggest issues I've had were around RCS messaging. I was able to get it to work in the Owner profile, but it's a known issue that it doesn't work in secondary profiles. I'm just not getting group texts from iPhone users anymore. Oh well, everyone who matters will contact me on Signal or SMS directly. I was never able to get E2EE working over RCS with iPhone users anyways, even though my carrier supposedly supports it and the iPhones were updated.
It's also exposing just how much I depend on Big Tech. I'll probably be switching to Proton for mail, calendar, and VPN. My one gripe is they don't have a way to sync contacts to my phone. Still, Ill happily pay $10 a month for storage and services that don't spy on me for advertising instead of paying $3 a month for a service where I can't expect any privacy.
I'm still using Big Tech while driving unfortunately, haven't explored alternatives to Maps and Spotify yet.
I guess the only way to be sure is to watch live sporting events. Maybe one of the side effects of this LLM boom is that F1, MLB, NBA, etc will have more viewers.
Someone should tell the politicians of both parties that, because they are still bending over for big tech.
The Garmin vivoactive 5 is the one I was considering since it seems relatively affordable and apparently once the card is on the watch through the Garmin Pay app then it works without the phone being connected.