Privacy-first alternatives: social media, video conferencing and other communications tools

I get asked about alternatives to the big social media and comms companies out there. I thought I'd share a list that I compiled but feel free to add other resources to it in the comments.VIDEO CONFERENCING:Jitsi Meet https://jitsi.org/jitsi-meet/. No downloads required. Easy to use. Free. Privacy-first, video conferencing, open source software.Wire (alternative to WhatsApp and Zoom; built for collaboration): started by the founder of Skype, Messaging, video, and voice communications. Also, allows for self-destroying messages. https://wire.com/en/Wickr Me (alternative to WhatsApp and Zoom): Used by media, journalists and other professionals and lay people for secure, private, E2E encrypted communications. More affordable than Zoom, Skype and many others. $0/month for up to 30 users. Then, $5/month/user. https://wickr.com/products/me/EMAIL: For email that doesn't track you, maintains your privacy (i.e. no spammy ads) and doesn't sell your data, please consider Fastmail.com. I tried A LOT of privacy-first email applications. I love Fastmail. They use a paid subscription service and it costs as low as $5/month. Another one is hey.com started by the founder of Basecamp, Jason Fried. It is also subscription based. It has the largest storage option (100 GB!) available for just $99/year vs. Gmail, Fastmail, etc. (30GB).WEB BROWSER: Don't want your web activity tracked? Or spamming you with ads? Try Firefox https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/exp/firefox/new/or Brave (& it comes with its own adblocker!) https://brave.com/WEB SEARCH: Oof. The things they do with your search history is scary and shocking. Try Duck Duck Go. You can set it to integrate with your browser of choice. Their motto: We don't track you. Ever. https://duckduckgo.com/ And you can buy ads without sacrificing viewer privacy. https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/company/advertising-and-affiliates/PROFESSIONAL NETWORKING (alternative to LinkedIn): Try Bridge, currently available in invite-only Beta. I'm happy to invite you - just DM me. Expand your network 10x and do it in a more elegant, private and simple way. https://brdg.app/SOCIAL MEDIA ALTERNATIVES:Vero (alternative to Facebook and Instagram): 4 million users and growing! https://vero.co/Diaspora (alternative to Facebook): Ad-free, control your own data. https://joindiaspora.com/MeWe (alternative to Facebook): private, ad-free, founded in Albuquerque, NM. https://mewe.com/<-----I'm here now! No longer on Facebook.Flickr (alternative to Instagram): an oldie but goodie. https://www.flickr.com/Plurk (alternative to Twitter) https://www.plurk.com/portal/Mastodon (alternative to Twitter) probably the most well-known of the Twitter alternatives: https://joinmastodon.org/Signal (alternative to WhatsApp) https://www.signal.org/ Read about how Signal compares to WhatsApp and Telegram https://beebom.com/whatsapp-vs-telegram-vs-signal/Element.io (alternative to WhatsApp) You don't need a cell phone number to use it. https://element.io/

Privacy-first alternatives: social media, video conferencing and other communications toolshttps://spreadprivacy.com/

Privacy-first alternatives: social media, video conferencing and other communications toolshttps://spreadprivacy.com/