No, we're not connected with the existing movement on Reddit. We are aware of it, and we are supportive of what they are also looking to achieve (and there are many such similar movements and communities out there, which is clearly a good thing!) but specifically regarding this subreddit, we disagree with their policy whereby they do not allow any political messages to be shared regarding Google on their subreddit.

For us this is very important - to DeGoogle clearly is a political decision! Everything is political and so to adopt a content policy that refuses to allow content relating to politics, for us is an oppressive policy. 

Even if you don't consider yourself as political, or if you don't want to DeGoogle for political reasons... there's no avoiding the fact that to decide the products or services you chose to support is itself a very politically-motivated decision.

That said - we will happily reference and direct people to useful content on the DeGoogle subreddit when appropriate. And we hope that in the future the moderators there will review and change their decision to ban any submissions which are deemed as being 'political' in nature.

Whilst we do offer a limited amount of custom support for specific instances (see our Get Help page (external link)), we try to first suggest that those looking to DeGoogle spend time attending one of our upcoming webinars, or that they explore the resources and guidance we have referenced elsewhere on the website. This is to ensure you have done all you can internally, before having to ask our kind volunteers to provide pro-bono technical support.

There's nothing wrong with asking for help - but we want to avoid this being over-used! 

We chose Google because it has become synonymous with the internet and is arguably the biggest and worst of the Big Tech world. But that said - we consider the act of DeGoogling as not being limited specifically to the act of detaching yourself from Google products and services... for us it could (and should) reflect a larger movement whereby people become aware of how BigTech has infiltrated our lives, and to suggest that we detach ourselves from all forms of BigTech. So that means Microsoft, Meta (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp), Apple, Amazon, Twitter/X, OpenAI and any other forms of BigTech.

We hope that in the future we can help others detach from these forms of BigTech too - or that we inspire and encourage other people to start similar movements aimed at specific tech companies.

Also from a psychological point of view - its far easier to focus on one tech company (eg Google/Alphabet) which is already hard enough, vs trying to cover every BigTech company out there.

It would be easy enough for this movement to get co-opted by other corporations, for example if rivals of Google were to get involved and ask that we recommend their products/services.

With that in mind, there is no commercial activity involved on this website. No affiliate links will be used, and no advertisements will be shown. This is a not-for-profit movement with the aim of supporting the ethical, alternative, privacy-first and opensource tech alternatives that exist.

Many of these companies require support (and money) in order to operate. They can't all survive from offering free services like Google, because they aren't operating in a kind of vulture capitalist, walled garden environment. 

This is a volunteer-led, decentralised movement whereby the people involved can make a limited amount of decisions as to how the website and movement operates - but there won't ever be a process of monetisation.

Note that we will allow and encourage donations (external link) to cover the small costs involved in operating the website (and we have a transparency page (external link) that documents such costs).