Dog + elections + getting rid of Google

[luzula]

1) We have a dog in the house! \o/ It belongs to one of my housemates who brought her here from India at great effort and cost and now he and his ex-girlfriend have shared custody of her. Her name is Safid, and she has big sensitive ears, and is slightly skittish but very friendly and curious. Also she likes to lick ears. Here she is in my room (she wanted company while housemate was away):



2) Sweden is having elections this weekend. I had a hard time deciding between the left party and the feminist party, which was balancing on the edge of getting into parliament, but I finally went with the left party. Now let's see how it goes...*frets*

3) I am now Google-free! Or I will be soon, anyway. I have:

- Changed my search engine to DuckDuckGo, which was remarkably easy: just install the DuckDuckGo Plus addon if you're using Firefox. I am quite happy with DDG so far--I like the thing where you can add !w to a search to just get wikipedia results, and similarly with other sites.

- Joined a Swedish democratic organization for email. Basically, you pay a membership fee and get an email address, they own their hardware and everything is decided democratically (not that I have the time to engage much in it). I'm under no illusions that this means my internet traffic is not being spied on, but at least it's not going through Google, which is a start.

My new fannish email is: luzula at fripost dot org. Obviously it will take time to phase out my old gmail addresses, but use that one if you want to reach me. : )

Comments

[malnpudl]

Cute dog is cute! Yay dog in the house! This makes everything better. :-)

[luzula]

Dog cuddling does indeed improve a great many things. : )

[malnpudl]

Any idea what she is? She looks like at least part sighthound (Ibizan, etc). What a sweet face.

[luzula]

I don't know, no! But housemate said she is a street mongrel, so maybe nobody knows exactly.

[boxofdelights]

Oh! she's beautiful!

[mific]

Aha! Clearly you need my paranoid-about-Google icon!

[luzula]

She is! Quite different from other dogs I've known, but lovely.

[luzula]

Ha, I would if I ever used any icon other than this one. And yeah, I can't believe they chose that login screen.

[isis]

I read that as "Dog Elections" and I would totally vote for your housemate's.

[luzula]

Ha ha. Well, a lot of the election posters could have had "vote for the cute dog!" and been just about as meaningful as they were.

[feroxargentea]

What delightful jackal ears!

[luzula]

I know! I really like her ears.

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

I used DuckDuckGo for a while. I'm not sure if I like it, even though I love the privacy aspect. I should go back to using it again. I have gmail, but am thinking of changing. Should I use my Verizon email or go with something else? Verizon = yet another corporation.

[china_shop]

I tried DDG for a while, but found I preferred Startpage, fwiw. Maybe give that a go? :-)

[china_shop]

What a lovely dog! :-)

Best of luck with your elections. I'm about to go off and wave placards for the Green party. :-)

[luzula]

I immediately liked DDG, actually. What is it that you don't like about it?

Am liking new email, except for a few details...I suppose I'll either get used to them or figure out how to fix them.

[luzula]

She is lovely! Very different from my parents' dog, both in looks and personality.

Thanks! And good luck. : )

[the_antichris.livejournal.com]

Your room looks so lovely with all the plants. (And the dog, of course!)

[luzula]

Yeah, I love having plants in my room. A lot of them are cuttings that I got from my sister when I moved in a year ago, and they've really grown (not the one on the floor though!)

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

I think it's just aesthetics. I tend to be set in my ways visually. I'll probably try it again (or possibly Startpage, I'll definitely check that out as well). I am definitely looking for a new email. Is fripost something that works well for users outside of Sweden?

[luzula]

Sorry, it's not available outside Sweden. They figure that since they want it to be a democratic organization, it doesn't make sense to have members who can't easily make it to meetings.

I guess you could get a Riseup account? Not precisely the same thing, but pretty much the opposite of corporate, anyway. : )

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

They figure that since they want it to be a democratic organization, it doesn't make sense to have members who can't easily make it to meetings.

Well, that makes sense. I didn't read the part about meetings. :) I'll look into Riseup. Thanks!