Why I am saying Goodbye to Google

by happyorright

It has been a long time decision, but today I said goodbye to Google and deleted my account with them. I no longer have a Gmail address, or any of the other older services I use to use. Why did I do this? For the reasons I list below.

  1. Privacy. Google just wouldn’t stop being creepy with peaking in and letting me know it was looking at me. I don’t need any company to scan every word of every email I ever send. It doesn’t matter that it is free, your privacy is worth something. I switched to Fastmail a week ago and it has been a pleasure to use. No ugly interface, no spam, and a very nice threaded interface with long email chains. Google has not grown past being an advertising company.
  2. google walletPerformance. Gmail was down several times in the past few years in comparison to services like Rackspace that were never down. When a lesser funded company does something better and more reliable than a bigger company, you have to ask yourself why? Because for Rackspace they need the revenue, while Google doesn’t get money from its services. If you don’t get money from services, then there is no motivation to have a good product.
  3. Quality. I said before that Gmail but all of google services are ugly. Plus they keep changing the interface and so you spend time learning where things are. This is not worth it to me. The fact is that time is money and you can’t waste your time and not feel frustrated by it. I never liked the fact that google had poor service for Gmail, and when customers had problems they basically had no one to turn to. I had several customers who were hacked in their Gmail so to me, this is no longer a quality solution. Even with dual authentication they got hacked, so they had to go to application level passwords. At that point its time to change to another provider since Gmail clearly doesn’t have it anymore.
  4. iOS support. Gmail had an iOS app that crashed on me many times, and was a battery hog. Since I am not using it anymore my battery life has increased. When a company only has to do things “good enough” then it is wasting everyone’s time by “competing”.

I will not be using any Google services, and with my use of AdBlock I won’t be supporting them anymore in any way. I am also going to test Safari/Firefox and compare them against google for performance, quality and use. It’s clear that Google now goes on my list of Brands to avoid.

What use is money?

by happyorright

From the research and link below

  1. both material and experiential wealth tends to reduce people’s ability to savor simple joys and experiences.
  2. Many people believe that becoming rich is the path to happiness, but pursuing wealth may be an ineffective means of pursuing well-being

This is the evidence for what I said a few days ago about Appreciation and action as a currency. That was based on my experience of helping wealthy people with technology.

The report says many interesting things that having continual pleasurable experiences may decrease our ability to be happy. That too many experiences and material possessions will decrease our happiness. I have seen this with single people. They are having pleasure all the time yet they complain they are unhappy. It doesn’t make sense on the surface because you would think short-term good feelings would translate into long-term good feelings.

However when you think about it more, it makes sense. Happiness doesn’t seem to consist in doing something, but in being something. If we are always doing, how much are we just simply being? What is it to be? It is to be able to be content without being amused by other things, or needed to feel drawn to stimulation to make us happy. You see this in people with addictions. They feel that they need to do their addiction to be happy, yet their addiction only gives them temporary relaxation at best and then they feel worse. What a strange idea we have that if we only increase our addictions, we can be happy?

Why do I focus on happiness so much? I see everyday when I help people that they think that technology will make their life better. Yet the truth is that is only a tool that can be used to help as well as harm. When people use technology to further their additions, it clearly is not making them happy. It is not things in themselves that bring us happiness, but our intension to use them that makes all the difference. Are you asking yourself as a famous person once said “Are those who have that thing/activity happier for doing/having it?”. If not, perhaps we should leave that alone and find something that gives us a sense of contentment long-term, not just a momentary thrill.

via Can money buy happiness? The relationship between money and well-being — ScienceDaily.