Bye, Google!

It all started with the management team hired by my landlords. I want to make clear: that team is comprised of human beings. This means they have their positives and negatives like anyone else, including me, you, etc. I’m not writing this to slam any of them, just to try to summarize what happened:

A few months back, a former head manager allowed my water to be cut off without calling or knocking on my door. She claimed it was an “emergency” but never gave any indication that it matched my state’s definition of an “emergency” water shut off. I called her bosses, complained, made some suggestions, and, well, I think I (and other tenants too, over the same issue in past years) had a hand in getting her fired (but really, she did this to herself, I think).

Fast forward to this month. One of the current managers told me that I’m “required” (by their corporate bosses, not by law) to sign up for a community website used for emergency alerts, direct rent deposits, stuff like that. In theory, it all sounds really great! In reality, that doesn’t work for me, for tons of reasons.

My phone’s battery keeps dying and having to stay off while charging, I get charged for every text so I just don’t do texting at all, and I don’t sit and stare 24/7 at some stupid email account that doesn’t have a good notification system (and again, that requires that everything be turned on and perfectly set up at all times; that doesn’t happen in my home, practically ever).

I told that manager, “The best way to get a hold of me is to come knock on my door.” And that’s exactly how it’s been for years and years; generally, that’s worked just fine. It’s a matter of the office being willing to hire, train, and properly use the various maintenance workers (who they have sometimes used to deliver packages to peoples’ doors, as well as put notes on them, etc) for that purpose.

Anyway, I decided that I do want to opt-in on the community website, but the issues above need addressing. First thing was first. The other night, even while my phone was off, the battery reverse charged itself. I don’t know how, exactly, but I had it plugged into the wall via USB, the phone was (supposedly, I guess) fully off, and when I checked it a few hours later, the % had gone down, rather than up. I’d had enough of that phone, so I ordered a new one and had it delivered that day. (Yes, I have checked for replacement batteries, as the battery is removable, but none that could be deemed “safe” came up in the searches, so I gave up on that).

Setting that phone up has been amazing though! It included the option to skip signing into WiFi and adding a Google account. I know, that sounds “scary” to those who haven’t done it. No, I didn’t have to root my phone. I just clicked on “skip” when the WiFi sign-in screen came up. Literally, that’s all I had to do. Google didn’t try to force me to log in… Nothing. I just have the Android OS without being logged into Google, and I still have my WiFi access. It is true, a couple times, the phone bugged me to “fix” that, but I just ignored that junk.

Instead, I used the only browser available to me at the time, Chrome, to download Opera and F-Droid’s app store. Bottom line is, those are the only two apps I need on that phone to get started in my unentangled new Google-free life! Yes, I do still have to be careful about which apps I download, even from F-Droid’s curated app list, but there are some controls over which apps can even show up in their store as I search or browse it, and it really has been a pleasant experience.

I set up Opera as the default browser app, and really, the only thing left I’d love to do, but am not able to, is to completely remove all the Google apps from the app drawer on the phone. I can force-stop and deactivate them, and I still need to go about doing that. But that won’t remove them from the phone, or even from the app drawer. I’ve done what I can to just stick them all in a group on a screen I never use, next to the main screen, and just call it done.

Here’s what I think is really needed, a completely new and different OS (and OS kernal/core).