Google Alternatives?

I've been with Google since the beginning, but recently my patience with the company has run thin. They have no respect for their customers and lately they've retired many of the services that I (and others) used regularly and are forcing additional services on users that are useless to many of us.

Google is all about the $£. I realize this now, but kept holding on because they were once the "Don't be evil" company. Obviously, they've climbed the ranks and are now the Demon King of the internet.

Does anyone have suggestions for alternatives?

Yahoo is not an option for me. And I've considered setting up my own e-mail server, but am worried about getting too much spam. I'd like a service that's been around for a while and doesn't show signs of disintegration. The more basic and user friendly the service, the better.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts.

Hotmail's been around for a while. Microsoft is pretty standard still.

Connor Lidell wrote: Hotmail's been around for a while. Microsoft is pretty standard still.

Thanks, Connor. I hadn't considered that. I think I have an account there anyway (didn't they integrate Hotmail with Live.com at some point?).

My domain name is connected to Google (Google Apps), so I can send and receive e-mail from my domain. I seem to recall Microsoft working on an option for e-mail via a custom domain name, so I'll look into that as well.

I appreciate your response.

Yeahyeah! No worries.

Exactly what service are you looking to replace? Search engine? Email? Start page portal?

Proteus wrote: Exactly what service are you looking to replace? Search engine? Email? Start page portal?

I'm not too worried about a start page (though I did use iGoogle, which you may know is being retired in November). And I use DuckDuckGo as my search engine most of the time now.

Mainly, I'm looking for a new e-mail system. I'm researching Hotmail/Live/Outlook at the moment, and that option seems pretty decent (they have a Google Apps alternative so I can still utilize my domain name when sending/receiving e-mail). I'm not sure it's a step up, but it seems acceptable for what I need (which isn't much).

Outlook has received a Lot of positive reception for many things including its spam filter which stood up against gmail's almost dominantly. It's surprised a lot of people. If I didn't or couldn't use gmail, that would be my personal choice of alternative.

Bing doesn't do it for me. Altavista used to be better then Excite IMO back in the days before Google, then Google killed them all with that clean interface and great results.

I've noticed in the last few years the quality of the results are dropping. Google still seems to be the best for me though. What don't you like about Google, despite their persistent need to push paid results into peoples faces, anything in particular?

I use gmail quite a lot, and love gmap's.

Adder wrote: Altavista used to be better then Excite IMO back in the days before Google

I loved Altavista back in the day.

Adder wrote: What don't you like about Google, despite their persistent need to push paid results into peoples faces, anything in particular?

I didn't mean to sound so cranky in the original post. In short, Google has been streamlining the services that it offers over the last 2 years and I've lost many of the tools I used to use regularly, I don't find the new services they're forcing on users useful, the user interface (even with customization) is not intuitive to me and feels unnecessarily bulky, customer service is non-existent for free users (and is lacking for paid users), and I have issues with both the old and new privacy policies.

This started a while ago, however, when Google automatically merged my Gmail and YouTube accounts - the result being that I couldn't access my YouTube account or videos and had to create a new one (because the two accounts used the same login). I tried to get help and was denied on various fronts. The one answer that I did receive (as a free user at the time) was "Google doesn't offer technical support."

I think I've been looking for an excuse to jump ship for a while.

I think everyone who's been online a while has used altavista at some point

I too am annoyed at google'd direction, ever since they decided to be social (buzz and plus). I despise the javascript search stuff, it's slow and often breaks imo. I hate having to merge my google account with my YT account, although I too had the same login but didnt lose anything?

All the interfaces, youtube gmail, etc are getting worse and worse. I miss the old beta gmail (I got my account way back, when it just started and you needed to be invited to be able to use it).

Anyway. I just survive with google. I still feel that overall they're better than what I've seen elsewhere.

Kind of where I'm at, too...

Don't know of anything better out there so I keep using the evil empire. But if you find anything better, let us know!

ren wrote: I hate having to merge my google account with my YT account, although I too had the same login but didnt lose anything?

I've often wondered if my account just didn't get updated properly at some point because I dealt with a string of technical glitches while I was with Google. I wasn't the only person to have a bad merging experience, as there were others in the Google forums complaining of the same issue. So it's great that you didn't have any problems! Something very similar to what happened when my accounts were merged happened yesterday when I was trying to delete my YouTube account (this time I believe it was related to Google+), but fortunately I'd already deleted my personal videos.

ren wrote: Anyway. I just survive with google. I still feel that overall they're better than what I've seen elsewhere.

Learn_To_Know wrote: But if you find anything better, let us know!

I'm really pleased with Outlook.com. It's simple, intuitive, allows custom domain names, offers integration with Facebook, Twitter, Skype, and Messenger - and you can even connect your Gmail contacts and calendar if you wish. Spam protection has improved since Hotmail and is apparently as effective as Google's (I can't comment on this, as I've only been on the system for a day).

It's definitely worth checking out, and a very good alternative (unless you're smitten with Google+). You can open an account on Outlook.com if you just want to test it out. If you have a PC with Windows, chances are you have an account already (re: Live.com). I remember looking at Hotmail a while back and wasn't excited about it, but I'm impressed with the new mail system.

Thanks again, Connor. I probably wouldn't have considered this option had you not mentioned it.

So what's wrong with Google again? Yea, there are all these superfluous functions and it kind of annoyed me a little when it actually forced me to register to G+ or when it auto-registered me to YouTube, but I mean.. its not that it generates spam, the system is still very intuitive and has no delays because of ads, it actually saves your accounts and passwords if you need it to (unlike hotmail), it doesn't force you to be active with the hord of new functions or use them at all for that matter and it doesn't charge you a penny either way, and I have yet evidence to see that it spies on its clients, like some argue it does. Its about as good as it gets in virtually everything I'd expect from a mail server and indeed more, for people who need more. I don't quite understand the problem.

And just to bash hotmail/outlook a little more: If the concern is that Google has become a monopolist and money whore, as late as it did given the fact that a search engine is the most powerful equipment one can possibly have in a civilization with a system similar to what is the internet, and they still aren't exploiting it anywhere near as much as one would expect, then I don't get it how Microsoft, that just so happens to be no less than the very master plate of monopoly and addiction to profit, is any improvement over that. Now granted, the mailing system is fair enough and there are a couple of little insignificant things they don't force down your throat but neither of that is that much, or at all, a difference or let alone an advantage.

I appreciate you sharing your feelings on this, Gisteron. I think, ultimately, choosing an e-mail provider is about finding what matches each individual's needs and expectations. What is comfortable and intuitive to one person may not be for another.

I'm extremely happy with Outlook and my decision to step away from Google, but that doesn't mean I don't acknowledge Google as a reasonable option for a large percentage of users.

Web designers seem to be making sites more 'user friendly' ie simplifying under the guise of making them easier to use. Websites have been wrecked so many times by trying to change a good thing. The use of touchscreen's has hastened this to some extent, and is another case of the proverbial dog chasing its tail. /rant
I'm just peeved because my favorite real estate website just wrecked their map search by stripping most of its functionality so it could have dopey oversized menu's and buttons instead.

https://duckduckgo.com/

Br. John wrote: https://duckduckgo.com/

And if not being stalked online is really what you're going for then https://www.torproject.org is the best in the business, though you would have to configure it to play videos

Good thing about gmail is if you don't like the interface (or the ads), you can just use IMAP. Google never added ads to emails, and gmail was really awesome just for that compared to other free email providers. They were also the first to offer apps (using gmail with your own domain). Totjo uses google apps for email. Does outlook/hotmail put ads in emails at all?

as email, GMAIL is ok, works, and there are so many options to set up, I do not have any problem, and have a lot of google services, like voice/docs, wave(back in his day) hangout and I do not have any problem

you can always use a client, if you don't like the web interface

search: i believe, nobody can beat google today. so I keep using it, and I really don't have any problem
just I don't like to be redirected to any country I visit, so I use google.com/ncr (no country redirection
as main page.

really happy, everything in one place, and no problems at all, google voice, is a great feature, I use it all the time.

google come on top (for me) on everything (time to time I use bing maps just for different angles.)

also using chrome help a lot