I use Google daily:
- the search engine
- my android mobile phone
- GSuite for notes, calendar and contacts.
- Gmail for my mails
- Maps and navigation
- Authentication: "Login via Google"
- ....
How does it feel to be addicted to this giant?
I can't answer this question, since can't imagine an alternative.
The search engine is great. I type in some words, and usualy I find good results immediately.
But wait. How can I know if the results are good? Without google I would be blind. I can only see these things which google presents me. So overall I can't judge if the results are good. I tried other search engines, and only in edge cases other engines sometimes provide better results.
Google provides these services to me. For free!
Isn't this great?
Google is a monopoly. Their market share is so big, that other players have no power.
For some strange reason I trust them.
I think this word "trust" is very crusial for Google.
If people would stop to trust Google, then their money making machine would implode.
Google is different than the other big players. I could live happily without Amazon, Paypal, Facebook, Apple....
But I can't imagine a live without using a Google service.
I am addicted.
Is Google good or evil?
I know that Google has one single goal: To make money. That's their priority number one.
Google's mission:
Our mission is to organise the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.
Hmmm, they don't say something about money. They call it "mission". I think it is better to call to strategy or plan. These terms imply that there is an overall goal.
Google's strategy worked well in the last years. They achieved their goal. They earned a lot of money.
Maybe I'm just jealous, but there is something which I don't like. I don't like the fact that I don't have a choice.
Of course live without Google would be possible, but it would be hard. So I go the more convenient way and use their services.
What can or you do to at least reduce the power that Google has?
One major part of this whole business is the web browser.
My choice: use Chromium, not Chrome.
Chromium is open source. Of course Google develops this web browser Chromium. But source is available, and if Google wants to do evil things with Chromium in the future, then the source code could be forked and developed independently.
If you use Chrome, then Google knows almost everything you do.
But: How to sync passwords/bookmarks/history with Chromium? Google switched from "don't be evil" to "force chrome", since Google banned third party browsers from their Sync APIs. Two options: Follow the command of Google and switch from Chromium to Chrome? Or try to find an alternative: https://softwarerecs.stackexchange.com/questions/80905/chromium-based-browser-with-out-of-the-box-password-sync