Goodbye Big Five

Want to Really Block the Tech Giants? Here’s How

Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Apple move more money than many medium-sized nations. Their extraordinary profits are won through extraordinary reach—this is not a secret. That a few companies are afforded unprecedented and shamefully unregulated access into our homes is now an unremarkable fact of living with tiny computers everywhere. When Gizmodo reporter Kashmir Hill,…

Tech News Dhruv Mehrotra Feb 7

I Cut the ‘Big Five’ Tech Giants From My Life. It Was Hell

Week 6: Blocking them all A couple of months ago, I set out to answer the question of whether it’s possible to avoid the tech giants. Over the course of five weeks, I blocked Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Apple one at a time, to find out how to live in the modern age without…

Tech News Kashmir Hill Feb 7

I Cut Apple Out of My Life. It Was Devastating

Week 5: Apple When I first conceived of this experiment—cutting the tech giants out of my life one-by-one—I hadn’t thought to include Microsoft (because I use very few of their products) or Apple (because I use so many of theirs). I have two MacBook Airs, one for personal use and one supplied by my work.…

Tech News Kashmir Hill Feb 5

I Cut Microsoft Out of My Life—or So I Thought

Week 4: Microsoft When I initially planned to block all the tech giants from my life, I hadn’t thought to include Microsoft, mostly because Microsoft is—these days, at least—rarely on the receiving end of criticism for destroying civilization as we know it. Microsoft’s days as a tech supervillain are a distant memory, dating back to…

Tech News Kashmir Hill Jan 31

I Cut Google Out Of My Life. It Screwed Up Everything

Week 3: Google Long ago, Google made the mistake of adopting the motto, “Don’t be evil,” in a jab at competitors who exploited their users. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, has since demoted the phrase in its corporate code of conduct presumably because of how hard it is to live up to it. Google is no…

Tech News Kashmir Hill Jan 29

I Cut Facebook Out of My Life. Surprisingly, I Missed It

Week 2: Facebook After Facebook’s hell-year of scandal, and its unabating erosion of our privacy—a topic I’ve been covering for over 10 years—I never thought I’d miss the social network. But here I am, staring at my screen, feeling strangely alone. In the second stage of my epic quest to thwart the world’s most powerful…

Tech News Kashmir Hill Jan 24

Life Without the Tech Giants

Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Apple collectively make products that we love, products that we hate (but can’t stop using), and products that dictate how we communicate and how we are seen. Their devices and services make our lives easier than they’ve ever been before, yet more complicated in unforeseen ways. They are so ubiquitous…

Tech News Kashmir Hill Jan 22

I Tried to Block Amazon From My Life. It Was Impossible

Week 1: Amazon Apparently, I am a masochist. I am on a mission to live without the tech giants—to discover whether such a thing is even possible. Not just through sheer willpower but technologically, with the use of a custom-built tool that would literally prevent my devices from accessing these companies, and them from accessing…

Tech News Kashmir Hill Jan 22

Goodbye Big Five

Want to Really Block the Tech Giants? Here’s How

I Cut the ‘Big Five’ Tech Giants From My Life. It Was Hell

I Cut Apple Out of My Life. It Was Devastating

I Cut Microsoft Out of My Life—or So I Thought

I Cut Google Out Of My Life. It Screwed Up Everything

I Cut Facebook Out of My Life. Surprisingly, I Missed It

Life Without the Tech Giants

I Tried to Block Amazon From My Life. It Was Impossible

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