Once I had to use the internet without and ad blocker ( shiver ). It was horrible. I still have nightmares.
Joking aside. I couldn’t believe how crammed full and chaotic sites were without an ad blocker. I have no evidence to support this other than my experience but I think , for me , ad blockers are good for my mental health. Being constantly exposed to all those messages trying to exploit insecurities can’t be good for people.
Anyways ad blockers are the best.
As much as I like the privacy frontends I think ‘we’ have to move to alternative platforms sooner than later and pull the bandaid vs. continuing to indirectly be dependent on google as the base platform.
I’ve used StandardNotes for years. They are great, very privacy friendly and lots of good features. I’ve also used Obsidian like others have mentioned but I didn’t use 95% of the features on either standard notes or Obsidian – now days I just use a general markdown files and store them in a git repo – low complexity and I like the simplicity of it. 100% recommend.
I use apple music. On linux I use Ciderwhich is amazing. Super clean interface and lots of nobs to turn in order to make everything sound and behave the way I like. If you like apple music or are looking for a streaming solution cider is awesome.
I am on pop is for my home desktop. I like the built in tiling manager. Ubuntu for work. Might give nix or kde a go next.
I use kagi. I think it depends on your level of concern , as it does with most things. Kagi has a pretty nicely written privacy policy. They do require an account but I signed up with a masked email and cc. For my use I find their privacy policy enough given the other measures I take but the main reason I like kagi is zero ads or prioritized posting. Experiencing search with out ads is a pretty awesome exp in my opinion. There are other ways to get free search with ads stripped out but this “feel” fundamentally different from a service purpose built to be ad free and private. I am happy to pay for ad free platforms vs using platforms that are trying to do privacy preserving ads but this is more of a personal stance and preference. I know your question was more about privacy than ads but I find the two closely linked. I’ve attached a summary of their privacy policy below:
I like theming , I am already a Firefox user. I think the sad reality is that for more adoptions , in the order of numbers that chrome puts up , Firefox needs to be a default application ; the common users doesn’t want to customize anything ( my hot take ).
I don’t think it is important that Firefox gets to those numbers as long as they can generate enough revenue to keep going.