Some tech-related things I personally use instead of their american counterparts

I would rather see people use Firefox than Vivaldi. We need a more diverse browser engine market to keep the web open. More here: https://better-tech.eu/web/article/switch-browsers/
- We need a more diverse browser engine market to keep the web open.
  We definitely do, but it's a tall order considering making a fully functional and daily usable browser engine is one of the most difficult programming projects to under take
  At least we got Ladybird with its brand new from scratch engine coming up though! (In 2028....)
  
  It's absolutely not a simple thing, but if we let the web turn into Chrome-only then Ladybird doesn't stand a chance. For now, more market share for Firefox and Firefox-based browsers is the only argument against making websites only work in Chrome.
  
  I can't get behind a browser built from scratch with C, not Rust, considering how integral browsers are to security these days. Plus there's the whole controversy around their pronouns and politics in coding stances.
- i use librewolf on PC (which is a firefox fork) and vivaldi on phone :3
  
  Fennec or Vanadium are good alt phone browsers, too. I do my best not to use chromium stuff at all, but keep the latter around on the work profile of my phone.
  
  I use Floorp (a Japanese Firefox fork) on PC, and Ironfox on Android.

Not sure it's a good idea to recommend Arch Linux to newbies migrating from Windows; maybe prioritize Mint or similar?
- this is not a recommendation post. this is what i personally use as i said in the title. i would always recommend Mint to a Linux beginner
  
  I misread, my bad. Good for you 👍

Signal is based in California, but they're a nonprofit.
- I thought it was odd to see it in an European alternative list.
  
  I don't personally have issues with nonprofits or FOSS as exceptions to my own personal boycott of US companies, but if anyone is looking for an alternative to Signal, SimpleX is probably the closest analog.
  It's decentralized and funded globally. It's based in the UK.
- Session is good alternative
  
  Nice, I hadn't heard of that one. For anyone wondering, it's pretty loose on who owns it, but the nonprofit that keeps things moving forward is based in Australia.

OP writes "instead of their american counterparts", and then puts signal.

Firefox as well any opensource doesn't have a country. You can build it and use it. Avoid any centralized service.

The 4 freedoms of software are:

    
Freedom 0: The Freedom to Run

    You can use the software for any purpose, without restrictions.

Freedom 1: The Freedom to Study and Modify

    You have access to the source code, allowing you to study how the software works and make changes to suit your needs.

Freedom 2: The Freedom to Distribute Copies

    You can share copies of the software with others, whether for free or at a cost.

Freedom 3: The Freedom to Improve and Share Improvements

    You can modify the software and share your changes with the community, helping others benefit from your improvements.

as long as these freedoms are observed it doesn't matter the country of origin.

Some of these products would not exist without their American counterpart, which directly fuel their existance.
Librewolf is just a hardened version of Firefox. It would not exist without the Firefox team continuing to develop Firefox and to fix its security issues.
Ecosia primarely uses Bing and Startpage uses Google for search results. Both would not exist without the search engines backing them.
I'm not saying these are bad products and I don't mean to criticiseze. I'm actually a librewolf user myself. I just think it is important to point out that the European label might be deceiving in this instance and might mislead people into thinking they are using something different than they actually are.
It might also not be so important. Perhaps focusing our energy on good open source projects and NGO-backed initiatives is desirable regardless of their origin?
idk food for thought
- Ecosia is actively developing their own search index together with Qwant. They are rolling out French and German results this year actually. AFAIK only like Mojeek and like Swisscow have their own search index (as well as Brave which is US based). But their current search results aren't really that great which is why I will stick to Qwant.
  I also don't fully trust Brave because of their whole crypto involvement but their search engine is pretty good from experience and definitely much better in terms of privacy than google.
  
  Ohh cool I didn't know that. I'll take a look myself and test them some more. I've recently been using Duckduckgo again since abandoning Kagi
  
  I've been using Ecosia for over a year now, it serves my purposes well!

Awesome stuff. Also don't forget European DNS companies like Quad9.
- And Mullvad
- You can also easily host your own DNS with Unbound
- Do DNS make any money?
  
  Yes, you have to pay to add a domain to the servers. They also probably use the requests data commercially.

How is Telegram US based? It is a Pavel Durov's offshore company from some Virgin islands. Not European, but not US either.
- In this case, I think the creator just avoids Telegram, for good reason:
  It’s not E2EE encrypted by default.
  The list is not named appropriately “US etc” but it’s not a bad list either
- These lists are almost always stupid.
  The worst part is that usually the maker hasn't used half of the things they recommend.. If they had, they wouldn't have recommended them.
  I'm guessing they tend to make these lists because of a personal connection to one or two companies they put in their list. Just as bit of free marketing.

American telegram? 😂
- I mean its not American but certainly not private
- i know its soviet technology😔

Startpage got bought by System1 in 2019. System1 is an American advertising company. I personally use Qwant for privacy reasons - They're also in the process of building their own search index together with Ecosia.
- Qwant is a disaster. Just go read their Wikipedia page. Gouging public money for essential being an ecosia without sending money to plant trees..
- I found qwant pretty terrible
  
  Really At least cutrently i found qwant provides the best search results
  
  Why?

I switched from chatgpt pro to lechat and have been using lechat for several weeks now.
It's so bad comparitively that I am considering to just not use AI anymore.
I used chatgpt daily many times and minstral le chat is just.... Incapable of understanding contextual things. It has still a long way to go before it can really compete, sadly.
- It's so bad comparitively that I am considering to just not use AI anymore.
  This is the way.
- i barely use AI anyway, so to me Le Chat is just as good :3
- I found this too and looked if there is something I could do to use chatgpt anonymous. I figured that might be better than continuing to use them in cases I expect le chat to be subpar. DuckDuckGo has an interface for this, although i haven't figured out much 'better' of a solution this is. You can go to http://duck.ai/ chat anonymous with:
  GPT-4o mini
  Llama 3.3 70B
  Claude 3 Haiku
  o3-mini
  Mistral Small 3
  According to DuckDuckGo (which is also US-based) your chat will not be used as training data. If someone here has more knowledge please provide it because I'm just not sure if this is much better than using ChatGPT directly except that openai doesn't get to build a user profile of me.

Did't know HERE we go, seems very good, thanks!
- I like it too and do use it, but unlike Foss alternatives they do use your data for commercial purposes, just so you know.
  
  Good to know but at least it's not google

I thought Bol only serviced Belgium and Netherlands?
- they do
  
  So not a truely European replacement for Amazon.
  Bol was great while I lived in NL, but now I've left, I'm struggling to find a good replacement

Signal was made in the US and paid for with US funding though?

Decent list, but I'd recommend Threema instead of Signal
- doesnt that cost money?
  
  It’s a one-time cost, but sadly this will put people off.
  
  Nothing is for free. If not with money, youre probably paying with data

Bol doesn't seem to ship to germany :(
- no, only to belgium and netherlands unfortunatly :/
  
  into the trash it goes

Not very beginner friendly to recommend Arch instead of Mint or Zorin.
- He said "things I personally use"
- Love mint

As a Google Maps alternative I could recommend Osmand and Cartes.
- What about Organic Maps?
  
  it's not going that great https://openletter.earth/open-letter-to-organic-maps-shareholders-a0bf770c

EDIT I misunderstood the post, this is what you're using, not what you're recommending, sorry about that!
I will still include my original comment below.
Still, I use and can recommend XMPP and the provider magicbroccoli.de! Arne the admin is also a swell guy!
Bold move recommending US Signal over European Telegram!
I'd personally trust neither very much; one's US funded and the other clearly not as secure outside “secret chats”.
But what about Threema? Or a European XMPP provider like the excellent magicbroccoli.de?
- magicbroccoli.de
  Tell me you're for weed dealers without telling me you're for weed dealers xD
  
  I was thinking the same, but I've not seen anyone seeming like a weed dealer so far. I think it's just a case of German humour 😋
- any reason for XMPP over Matrix?
  
  Hm fair point!
  XMPP is focused on personal chats, calls and group chats. It's a better drop-in replacement for Messenger, WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal.
  Matrix is great too, although it's focused on channel-based, administrated chat rooms. It's got a higher barrier of entry but is an excellent replacement for Discord, Teams and Slack for managing companies and other organised groups.
  They fill in different use cases and are both excellent decentralised services with the possibility to avoid non-European digital services!

Isnt startpage american?
- no :D
  
  Seems startpage is partly owned by Americans (system1). Seems they own even more than 50%. So how can you say its eu search website?
- Yes, they operate under EU law. But still majority owned by american company.

very nice, thanks for sharing

well looks like estonians will be proud of bolt now

I can highly recommend https://mapy.com/

Any good guide on RVX? I see plenty of websites of I search for revanced but I don't know which one is the official app
- i installed revance manager, through there RVX extended and MicroG. log into microg and your pretty much set (from memory)

I really like using Kagi for search!

I haven't kept up with all the changes in core developers the last few years, but isn't Arch mostly American?

Arch isn't european though, it's canadian.
- The Canadian who started it has long since retired from the project. A lot of the current developers live in Germany.

How can you tell someone is a Linux user? They will tell you, vocally, unprompted, and often with an infographic.
- i use arch btw🫣🫣🔥🤯🔥🤯😎😎😎
- I'm dissapointed.......No snappy remark on our command line usage /s
  
  Is that how you communicate with us humans?
- Would you rather them put reactos in the alternatives?
  Macos is American. Haiku, FreeBSD, and redox orgs are based in America. OpenBSD and GhostBSD are based in Canada