this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2025
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Privacy

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Yo yo! Help me choose some better private services! (lemmy.zip)
submitted 5 days ago by BlackSnack@lemmy.zip to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
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Yo yo!

I’ve been working on making my life more private and need some assistance picking suitable replacement options. Please let me know what you think of my list of if there are any opportunities for improvement! Here’s where I’m at …

Apple Maps -OSMandMaps. Seems like a good option, but it’s not ready out the box. I need to do more tweaking with it. -Magic Earth. Haven’t tested it yet, seems good. But I’m looking for free options first before I dabble with paid stuff.

AI (ChatGPT) -Lumo. Chat is really good. But I understand they are good because they syphon data illegally, so I’m ok “downgrading” when switching AIs. Lump seems pretty good so far. I can tell it’s not as advanced but it will do me fine for what I need. Also, i assume once I pay for lumo pro it will be more “powerful”. -Maple AI. Seems dope, also I like the pay model, pay for what you use over “x” amount of inquiries. Does anyone know how I owledgable/powerful it is? -local AI OR Ollama. These 2 are beyond my knowledge. I don’t understand how I run these on my own server? If you know anything about these please ELI5.

Google Docs -OnlyOffice. Seems like it does everything I want. -cryptpad. Just heard of this today, need to explore more. Seems dope, but it doesn’t have an app? From what I’ve seen definitely a strong contender.

Photo App (I haven’t looked into any of these yet) -Protón Drive. -ente photos. -I’mmich.

Google Drive -protón drive.

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[–] communism@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 days ago

Maps: CoMaps all the way. Very nice, polished map app using OpenStreetMap

AI: Just use Ollama. It's dead simple to run it on your local machine. They have docs here: https://github.com/ollama/ollama/tree/main/docs

Productivity suite: LibreOffice. If you want sync use Nextcloud (needs to be hosted) or syncthing (no hosting necessary).

Photo app: Nextcloud Photos app if you want cloud sync. I take it you use iOS given that you specify Apple Maps, in which case idk what foss photos apps there are on iOS, but Fossify Gallery on Android is good.

Cloud storage: Nextcloud. By definition, cloud storage needs to be hosted, so if you don't have a server, you can use something like Proton Drive or Cryptdrive, or find a public Nextcloud instance that lets you sign up (Disroot has one).

[–] birdwing@lemmy.blahaj.zone 8 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Wouldn't LibreOffice be a better option for replacing Google Docs?

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 days ago

Most likely. I just heard of it from this post.

[–] AtariDump@lemmy.world 8 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Magic earth is 99¢ a year.

https://www.magicearth.com/pricing

[–] neonix@reddthat.com 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

A shame they haven't figured out a way to subscribe for those opting out of the Google/Apple ecosystems, but I will watch this space!

[–] AtariDump@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Not sure what you mean; there is a subscription for iPhone.

[–] neonix@reddthat.com 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I mean that you can't subscribe unless you pay through Google Play or the App Store. So if one doesn't use those because of privacy concerns, or other ethical concerns, then there's no way to subscribe.

[–] AtariDump@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

From their own site:

[–] neonix@reddthat.com 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Indeed, and thank you, I will continue to watch this space!

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 7 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Oh bet. I didn’t see that. That’s basically free in my book. Have you used that one before, and if so do you like it compared to the OGs (google maps, Apple Maps)

[–] swelter_spark@reddthat.com 4 points 5 days ago

Not the person you're responding to, but I've used it for years and love it.

[–] autonomoususer@lemmy.world 1 points 4 days ago

Software is private, not services.

[–] treeofnik@discuss.online 4 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I chose Filen over proton drive, definitely have had a better experience with file syncing and desktop apps. They can also backup your mobile device’s photos.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Perfect, I’ll check that out!

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 2 points 5 days ago

Heads up the android app is in rework stage, don't judge too hardshly.

The Business model is solid though.

I would advise to avoid all in one service like proton. Their email is prolly the best service they provide.

[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 4 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Any yo yo here?

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 1 points 5 days ago

Ho ho ho

[–] mierdabird@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Using Ollama depends a lot on the equipment you run - you should aim to have at least 12gb of VRAM/unified memory to run models. I have one copy running in a docker container using CPU on Linux and another running on the GPU of my windows desktop so I can give install advice for either OS if you'd like

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 3 points 5 days ago (2 children)

I definitely need some advice for self hosting! I literally have no idea what I’m doing. I have a raspberry pi and another user said that may be enough to get started.

Could you share some videos or links or blogs that explain how to get started?

[–] irmadlad@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

I definitely need some advice for self hosting!

Great SelfHosting resource: https://lemmy.world/c/selfhosted

I selfhost a lot of the services I use. It's cost effective and educational all at the same time. The RPI is a good point to deviate from. When you outgrow it, repurpose it into a Pi-Hole. Personal VPS servers are quite affordable if you know where to look. Do some poking around and be sure to ask some questions. We all were noobs at something at some point and all knowledge and wisdom starts with a single question.....so don't be afraid to ask it.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Nice! Good sublemmy to follow! (Is sublemmy the right word)

Thanks for the tips! I just started playing around with ollama so I think the self hosting route is next.

[–] irmadlad@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago

(Is sublemmy the right word)

Never heard it before but it does sound appropriate.

[–] mierdabird@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 4 days ago

So I googled it and if you have a Pi 5 with 8gb or 16gb of ram it is technically possible to run Ollama, but the speeds will be excruciatingly slow. My Nvidia 3060 12gb will run 14b (billion parameter) models typically around 11 tokens per second, this website shows a Pi 5 only runs an 8b model at 2 tokens per second - each query will literally take 5-10 minutes at that rate:
Pi 5 Deepseek
It also shows you can get a reasonable pace out of the 1.5b model but those are whittled down so much I don't believe they're really useful.

There are lots of lighter weight services you can host on a Pi though, I highly recommend an app called Cosmos Cloud, it's really an all-in-one solution to building your own self-hosted services - it has its own reverse proxy like Nginx or Traefik including Let's Encrypt security certificates, URL management, and incoming traffic security features; it has an excellent UI for managing docker containers and a large catalog of prepared docker compose files to spin up services with the click of a button; it has more advanced features you can grow into using like OpenID SSO manager, your own VPN, and disk management/backups.
It's still very important to read the documentation thoroughly and expect occasional troubleshooting will be necessary, but I found it far, far easier to get working than a previous Nginx/Docker/Portainer setup I used.

[–] DieserTypMatthias@lemmy.ml 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

-Lumo

Why this when you can run Ollama on your computer.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I just started messing around with ollama. I must be doing something wrong because it’s sooooo slow. I still need to trouble shot it a lil bit before it becomes my main AI.

[–] DieserTypMatthias@lemmy.ml 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Buy a better GPU.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I was kinda doing it wrong. When I download the model it was very slow. But now that I’m using the model my inquires are done at an ok speed (10-30sec depending on what I ask)

Interesting that you need stronger GPU instead of CPU? Can you tell I know next to nothing about tech ….

[–] DieserTypMatthias@lemmy.ml 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

You can run it on a CPU, but you need to buy more RAM. I said GPU because they have way higher core count than CPUs and can tap into system RAM if their VRAM is full.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip -1 points 3 days ago

Gotta be honest, idk what half of the words you just said mean. Core count, vram… still have some learning to do.

My plan is to run ollama on my rig kinda like a server I guess. And then Use my phone to tap into that whenever I need it. From what I researched that seems doable, but will take some set up.

[–] EveryMuffinIsNowEncrypted@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (2 children)

Apple Maps -OSMandMaps. Seems like a good option, but it’s not ready out the box. I need to do more tweaking with it. -Magic Earth. Haven’t tested it yet, seems good. But I’m looking for free options first before I dabble with paid stuff.

If you like OSM but want a more user-friendly interface (disclaimer: I'm an Android user so I have no idea what OSMandMaps looks like), check out CoMaps! It was forked from Organic Maps due to heavy transparency concerns surrounding the former and uses downloadable OSM maps as a backend! It's available for iOS too!

https://www.comaps.app/download/

Google Docs -OnlyOffice. Seems like it does everything I want.

I've heard OnlyOffice is great, but if you don't need or want any AI stuff, don't mind a slightly less-modern UI, and collaboration isn't a requirement, then LibreOffice is pretty awesome too. Just giving you another option. ;)

https://www.libreoffice.org/

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 4 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Your like the 4th person to recommend libreoffice. That’s at the top of my list now.

[–] ScoffingLizard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 5 days ago

Been using it for ages. It used to have clunky spreadsheets ages ago but I have not noticed any issues in recent years.

[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

LibreOffice is starting to look nice! How an office suite looks shouldn't matter, but... it does. I have decades of experience with Word and Excel, and while I don't love them, they are kinda the standard against which I compare others. Before (last time I looked, a few years ago maybe) LO looked like Office 95. Trash. The program was okay, but it irked me it was an all or nothing affair, like you had the LO core and you only saved a few KB by ditching one of the apps in the bundle. These days, that is less of an issue — and LO looks more like Office XP. It's a good look, especially for Ribbon haters. (I quite like the Ribbon, but I'm also nostalgic for the time before it, so I could take or leave it.)

I'm on a Mac now and we have our own office suite (iWork) and that's free, private, and it can read/write docx/xlsx files (newer Office files) pretty well. We use Microsoft 365 at work, and I have no problems importing anything made on that to the iWork apps (Pages, Numbers), and/or exporting files from them to the Microsoft formats and using them at work.

I don't think any spreadsheet program is quite as good as Excel, though. And I really don't do number crunching with it, I use it more to make forms. What I really like in Microsoft's suite is Publisher, and Apple doesn't have an equivalent of that. Not sure if Libre does. I think the other suites want their word processor to do double duty as a publisher, but none of them are quite there IMO. But as far as Word goes? Yeah, I'll swap that out with Libre Writer or iWork Pages (or even Google Docs if I weren't concerned with privacy) in a heartbeat. Word is nothing special.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 2 points 5 days ago

I’ll prolly go with libre then since they have the best options that are private. And i have a PC so those Mac options won’t work for me.

[–] Brunette6256@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I like venice.AI better than lumo

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Ive heard of Venice! But tbh I skipped over it because I thought it was a sexy chat bot because their main feature is uncensored. I will add that to the list and check it out, thanks!

[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I was just looking at it. And I should preface, I do not like or trust AI chatbots. I saw "uncensored" in the headline, but when I scrolled down to the pricing, it's actually censored unless you pay. So for free you have a limited number of prompts (seems quite generous though) but there's a maturity filter implied on the free tier which is "disabled" on the $18/mo tier.

I've just been using Duck.ai (DuckDuckGo) for simple and stupid questions (e.g. who would win in a fight between X and Y, dumb shit like that) and it's been fine. You should know DDG has been linked to Bing (Microsoft) for searching. They claim their AI is private. Doesn't really concern me, I think all AI is inherently shit, so I take them at their word that it's private... because I'm not sharing anything with it that matters. Just asking it dumb questions.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 3 points 5 days ago (1 children)

That does slightly concern me that ddg is linked to Microsoft. If I’m going thru all this trouble to make my life more private then I believe I need to cut out the major companies as well.

[–] ScoffingLizard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

The farther away you get, the more you realize just how far in their greedy claws are. At that point, just remember your successes so far and the habits you have successfully broken. That is starting to help me.

[–] BlackSnack@lemmy.zip 3 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Sheesh, that sounds like a Black Mirror episode. I know a majority of my info/data now is most likely compromised, but moving forward I can make a difference. Also, I can prep these tools for the young ones in my family who aren’t on the internet yet.

[–] ScoffingLizard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 4 days ago

Every little bit helps. If you can not completely conceal yourself, just make it more expensive for them to collect data. Data centers are hard to maintain. The more you complicate things, the harder it is for them.