cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/59715800

Just wanted to share some insights after migrating away from Google et al. Curious to hear about others experience.

Please keep a few things in mind when reading this:

• the goal is not to be perfect - this is a long process that will never stop and it's just the start
• personally prefer self-hosted open source to alternatives that might be better at avoiding US, but have too much of a negative impact on my productivity
• you don't have to tackle everything all at once... small steps count too

Sharing this in hopes of inspiring someone to try an alternative or two. Also to hopefully hear about other experiences and what worked best for you.

TL:DR

Migrated from the big G to Vivaldi (browser), Proton (mail), Nextcloud (calendar, full collabora office suite, storage) , Immich (photos), Graphene OS (android).

DONE

Successfully migrated my Google accounts: private (16+ years) and my business Google Workspace - subscription now fully eliminated.

• Email: For now my emails will be with Proton. I know about the situation with their CEO, but wanted to make use of my standing subscription. Will be easy to switch again once it runs out. Proton import with the included migration tool was a breeze.

• Calendar: Tried the calendar but sync interval for remotely subscribed calendars is not high enough for my needs. Happy with the Nextcloud calendar feature.

• Office: Already running a Nextcloud instance for years and enabled contacts + calendar (caldav sync, carddav sync on android) and their office bundle (based on Collabora). Did an in-depth comparison of Cryptpad and Collabora and preferred the latter.

• Photos: Immich is just so good. Set up an instance for our family and everyone is so happy to not worry about Apple/Google storage subscriptions - and the awesome features immich brings. Handles our combined 130k images/videos well.

• Cloud storage: Would love a native Proton Drive sync client for Linux. For now my main storage will stay with Nextcloud.

• OS: Can highly recommend Ubuntu - a bit biased as long-time user. Finally made the switch from stock Android to Graphene OS. Love it so far. Would not recommend it to inexperienced users / non-tech people. Lineage might be more suitable. Love the discussions in this community lately introducing us to /e/OS, Sailfish, PostmarketOS, etc. I hope to see Sailfish and PostmarketOS go mainstream within a few years.

• Browser: Hard to decide as there are so many schools of thought and very vocal groups. Did some in-depth comparisons and decided to at least break free from Chrome for now. Went with Vivaldi and if they are forced to abandon manifest v2 I have LibreWolf and Floorp already set up as alternatives. Can highly recommend Floccus to sync bookmarks between devices (including mobile).

WIP

• Notion: Self-hosted AppFlowy looks promising, but have not tested it lately if it covers all my needs.

• Bitwarden: Hardest to let go for me personally, but might look into Vaultwarden. If Vaultwarden sucks and I really need to ditch Bitwarden it will most likely be Keepass based.

cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/24595976

Archive: https://archive.is/2025.03.29-083158/https://www.ft.com/content/218efe0d-e4a8-4f5b-ae96-de46e64dcb89

France, Ireland and Europe’s powerful farming unions are pushing Brussels to drop many food and drink products from its proposed retaliation against US tariffs.

The European Commission has received floods of objections from business and member states to its list of measures, underlining how the 27 member block might struggle to respond collectively to US pressure.

Jack Chambers, Ireland’s public expenditure minister, warned against “retaliatory and tit-for-tat measures that could worsen a trade dispute” on Friday while Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni told the FT the EU should negotiate over its high duties on some items. 

“There are big differences on the single goods,” she said. “That’s what we have to work on to find a good, common solution.”

cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/24595976

Archive: https://archive.is/2025.03.29-083158/https://www.ft.com/content/218efe0d-e4a8-4f5b-ae96-de46e64dcb89

France, Ireland and Europe’s powerful farming unions are pushing Brussels to drop many food and drink products from its proposed retaliation against US tariffs.

The European Commission has received floods of objections from business and member states to its list of measures, underlining how the 27 member block might struggle to respond collectively to US pressure.

Jack Chambers, Ireland’s public expenditure minister, warned against “retaliatory and tit-for-tat measures that could worsen a trade dispute” on Friday while Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni told the FT the EU should negotiate over its high duties on some items. 

“There are big differences on the single goods,” she said. “That’s what we have to work on to find a good, common solution.”

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/9946737

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/27537841

What could possibly go wrong? DOGE to rapidly rebuild Social Security codebase.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/31759199

Unlike the one in NYC, the homes here aren't skyscrapers, just huge, galling mansions. There's even a handy map that makes them easy to find.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.nl/post/31225510

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/31793106

[Canadian Prime Minister] Mark Carney Wednesday rejected accusations from his Conservative rival that he’s beholden to Beijing and said he thinks Canada’s trade-diversification strategy should prioritize boosting commerce with “like-minded countries” in Europe instead of China.

The Canadian government is trying to shift trade away from the United States in the face of growing protectionist tariff threats from U.S. President Donald Trump and his challenges to Canadian sovereignty, where he argues that Canada should be annexed as the “51st state” because it allegedly can’t exist without the U.S.

Asked if Canada should boost trade with China as it tries to reduce trade with the U.S., Mr. Carney pointed to Europe instead.

“We want to diversify with like-minded partners. That’s why I went to Europe in my first days as Prime Minister,” the Liberal Leader said during a campaign stop in Windsor, Ont., referring to a visit to Paris and London where he talked about Canadian companies playing a greater role in Europe’s military buildup.

“There are partners in Asia with whom we can build deeper ties,” Mr. Carney said. “But the partners in Asia that share our values don’t include China.”

[...]