Well, actually… I am and have been almost an over-user of everything Google for too long. Google is now capturing so much data from so many aspects of our lives, it’s more than a little concerning that people give away all this insight into their own lives to an advertising company.

Another difficulty I struggle with is that free software and open source generally means choice, so when I get a new handset based on Android, I’d expect to have some choice in the way things can be set up. The way the Motorola Razr HD was set up made it very difficult to avoid using a Google account for some parts of my data. I don’t equate using open source software with living by Google’s code, but on the Moto this was impossible to avoid.

Based on this and a very badly performing camera, I sent the Moto back to Amazon and got a full refund. It’s a shame; in terms of handset build I think it’s the nicest smartphone I’ve ever owned. Regardless, with a Samsung Galaxy S4 now on contract, I’m getting on much better and am currently planning/writing a data liberation series of blog posts which will show how you can live as free as possible from malicious software & activity tracking.

Stay tuned! 🙂