I was asked to post this information here for the privacy and security aspects.
My use of alternative software & services started when I stopped using as many Google products & services as I could over ten years ago.
Between the actions of various governments, their officials, the EU, Google, Twitter, & Facebook over the last two years we now know who can't be trusted. FYI, just to be clear hosting data outside the US will not protect it from the NSA. Like they're foreign counterparts these groups go after everything on a global scale.
So if you own your own router when was the last time you updated it? ISP routers are niece & convenient but they have limited security. Buying your own or better yet building your own network firewall are far more secure options.
Facebook and Google track everything we do. The Facebook apps & Chrome shouldn't be running on your systems & devices. Many of Chrome's extensions also track you.
Use Revo's free option to uninstall Chrome. Firefox is barely any better as the company is full of SJWs. Meanwhile Opera was bought out by the Chinese, so if you use this browser do not use their built in password manager.
At the time when I decided I didn't want Google or my ISP's email option that left Hotmail as the only service with comparable features to Google. So I used Microsoft/Hotmail for everything standard and Hushmail for stuff I wanted to keep private. Now I still use Microsoft but I use Virtru for encryption and Telegram for private communication.
So far Microsoft has been agnostic not interfering with auto complete or their searches. So for the time being I will have some of their services listed.
I have also kept Cyanogen OS listed and added the Cyanogen Mod fork.
So here is my big list of alternatives. If anyone has more suggestions hit me with a reply.
Email:
Encrypted Messenger Software:
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Telegram (My pick) - Similar to What's App only independent, secure, & on all major platforms including the desktop.
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Signal - Encrypted FOSS messenger, only on iOS & Android.
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BBM - Old school with a big user base, fully encrypted, & a feed/channel system.
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Ricochet - Anonymous instant messaging for privacy through the TOR network.
Browsers:
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Brave (Blink) - by former Mozilla CEO. (My pick)
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Vivaldi (Blink) - by former Opera devs.
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Pale Moon (Goanna) - Firefox fork.
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Midori (WebKit)
Password Managers:
Search Engines:
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DuckDuckGo - privately uses Yahoo (Bing). Has "bang" options.
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StartPage - privately uses Google.
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Bing - A full array of features and a rewards system you can sign up for.
Youtube Alternatives:
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note: If you're a serious content creator than I suggest mirroring your channel on several of these:
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Live Leak (My pick) This is the place to mirror your Youtube channel. They are anti-censorship.
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vimeo <- A lot of original artistry content.
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Break - Popular Youtube competitor that's been around awhile.
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Vid.me - Another good site to mirror your content.
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Gvid - An experiment for a low cost, content neutral replacement for Youtube.
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metacafe
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veoh
Alernate DNS:
Mobile OS Alternatives:
Social Media alternatives:
VPN:
Alternate web technology:
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I2P - The invisible internet project, similar to TOR.
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ZeroNet - Peer to Peer, Open, free and uncensorable websites.
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IPFS - A peer-to-peer hypermedia protocol.
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Matrix - Matrix is an open standard for decentralised communication.
Miscellaneous:
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TheTrigger ago
I've been running Pale Moon for months. Sometimes, I just leave it running for weeks on end; without actually closing out of the browser (just minimizing it, when not in use) and right now it's at ~350MBs with a bunch of tabs open. It's been running non-stop for a few days. I remember having to restart Firefox every few hours, during heavy use, 'cause it would sometimes end up using almost all of my RAM. To the point that even the OS UI would lag.
Basically: it's everything FF should have been.