[INTPenis]

Which company is better?

When it comes to that level of data and maturity I think there is no valid competition.

I've consciously made the decision that I don't care what Google does with my data. They're going to attempt to track me regardless of if I use their services or not. I have friends who live off grid to get away from internet tracking but I don't envy their lifestyle.

So I think like most conscious people we just make the decision to willingly hand over whatever data we might be leaking to these companies, just for the convenience. Life is short, and filled with enough suffering, I don't need to inflict it upon myself in my daily routines.

[barnabee]

Kagi is much better for multiple reasons IMO:

1. I pay them, so am not so much the product, from an economic perspective

2. The search results are actually better, for me at least, especially with the customisations it allows

3. They do claim to be free of ads/trackers and care about privacy

4. I see no evidence of them doing the bad things Google do

5. Even if they were just as bad, they are much smaller and it would make sense to me to give my money and attention to them over Google for that reason alone

[disqard]

Like you, I'm a paid Kagi user. I also endorse all of the points you wrote above.

However, there is the uncomfortable truth that Kagi relies on Google search results to power its own infra.

[slau]

Why does a single company have to be better? Fastmail or Migadu for mail, Kagi for search. I still use YT on a semi regular basis.

Just because you’re used to using their products and it’s convenient to use them doesn’t mean there aren’t valid alternatives, or that using those equals “suffering”.

That has to be the most first world rant I’ve seen in a while.

[INTPenis]

I was looking for a new e-mail provider recently and migadu was a top candidate but I can't get over the fact that they price based on number of e-mails received. Isn't that easily exploited? Someone could potentially DoS your account.

We're not that different on a daily basis. I use proton but I'm looking for a new less complicated provider so I can handle all e2ee myself. Posteo.de, migadu or fastmail. I still have my gmail, 20 years now, but it's mostly a spam trap for sign ups on popular services.

I've tried some different search providers like DDG, not Kagi, but nothing compares to Google so far.

And of course I use YT, Premium even because I don't have the energy to participate in the adblocking arms race.

I think the biggest reason I'm still using mostly Google services is eID. Sweden depends a lot on eID and as far as I know it requires a stock Android phone to work. I've heard people getting it working without device integrity, but I just don't have the mental energy to deal with when it might stop working. My focus is on life, enjoying life, not fixing device issues.

So therefore eID drives me to use stock google Android, and then it's just easier to use the rest of the Google ecosystem for calendar, notes, search and so forth.

[slau]

Migadu doesn’t have automated quotas. They are understanding and they won’t block your account because of one bad actor. Even if you go over the limits, they won’t say anything unless it becomes a regular pattern.

I host email for quite a few people, and we’ve never even come close to the limits on my plan, and there’s some people who are very heavy email users.