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Honestly, with all the alternatives, I don't get why people still use Google.

Because it is simply the best option. Google has richer content, free storage is larger than any "alternative" and offers you more, you can create blogs, host, share, collaborate, edit remotely, use full-blown spreadsheet and word processor.

Google leads in storage, email, mapping, services, searches, and yes, it is free for the end user. Can you get it now?
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It's free in the sense that your data and profile pay for it. You have to weigh your privacy against the costs of a more secure system.

Just like in any other company. Apple does it as well. You have an ad identifier in your device that collects a lot of information about you and this is shared with other companies. And let me remind you that Apple also had a ad-service before, they left the business because they were not good at it (in their own words).
 
Isn't Google Takeout their thing for downloading a copy of all the data they have on you? This is something that some people use before disconnecting (as much as possible) from Google. Seems kind of ironic:

User: "I think Google is too creepy on privacy, I want to break up with you Google, give me back all my stuff"

Google: "Well, okay, but we're gonna give some of your videos to other random people on your way out the door, haha!"
 
What is a good alternative to gmail that is free to use and comes with as much storage?
Why insist it be free? Storage costs money. Bandwidth costs money. Servers cost money. Upkeep/admin costs money. Electricity costs money. If you want all that "for free", then you're the product, not the customer, and the provider is going to sell you, and/or access to you, to the highest bidder.

You can get paid email service from many sources for not that much money.

If you've paid for an iOS or macOS device, you can get an email account from Apple with some storage, for no additional cost. And Apple isn't selling your information or access to you (the email is a value-added bit that's part of the "Apple Tax" that people complain about). If you want more storage, Apple will rent it to you for a very modest price.
 
What is a good alternative to gmail that is free to use and comes with as much storage?

None. I feel ya.

Hopefully Apple will someday actually offer a reasonable alternative (not like the actual icloud plans which are laughable)
 
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Why insist it be free? Storage costs money. Bandwidth costs money. Servers cost money. Upkeep/admin costs money. Electricity costs money. If you want all that "for free", then you're the product, not the customer, and the provider is going to sell you, and/or access to you, to the highest bidder.

You can get paid email service from many sources for not that much money.

If you've paid for an iOS or macOS device, you can get an email account from Apple with some storage, for no additional cost. And Apple isn't selling your information or access to you (the email is a value-added bit that's part of the "Apple Tax" that people complain about). If you want more storage, Apple will rent it to you for a very modest price.

See my comment above. I understand that free isn't actually free. But cost isn't the only factor that goes in Google's favor. Gmail provides the best webmail interface and a top notch spam filter with nearly 0 downtime. iCloud is good, but not as good.

My point is, in a totality bang-for-buck analysis, it's really hard to think of anything that comes to close Gmail. Every alternative is a trade-off; everything else is some combination of worse spam filtering, worse webmail interface, worse reliability, or higher monetary cost. The only trade-off for Gmail is privacy of course.
 
Because it is simply the best option. Google has richer content, free storage is larger than any "alternative" and offers you more, you can create blogs, host, share, collaborate, edit remotely, use full-blown spreadsheet and word processor.

Google leads in storage, email, mapping, services, searches, and yes, it is free for the end user. Can you get it now?
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Yes but "free" also has a cost. Would you be willing to pay for it to get some more data privacy?
 
Only .01%? That's till 100,000 people.
The "technical issue" is said to have affected people who used the Google Takeout service to download their data between November 21 and November 25 last year.
Google said that only 0.01 percent of Google Photos users attempting Takeouts were affected.
Only 0.01% of Photos users using the Takeout service in a five-day period. I’d say the real number is substantially smaller than 100,000 considering that the overwhelming majority of users aren’t sitting around exporting their account data.

Of course, any number greater than zero is too many accounts impacted, but it’s probably a couple orders of magnitude smaller than 100,000.
 
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De minimus, right?

The 2014 iCloud hacking breach, which was all phishing, weak passwords and lack of 2FA, is still blamed on Apple by some posters on MR.

I never said that. What others said is no concern of mine.

Remember many people here have argued that the several Apple issues(butterfly KB, iPhone 7 speaker phone) are small percentage points and that these things happen.
 
Never keep anything you wouldn't mind becoming public on the cloud. Instead, use small SSDs encrypted with Disk Utility, always keeping a backup off-site such as in a small security box at the bank. How often you rotate it depends on the data and how often you update it.
 
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Ok, I’m sick of people not doing proper research.
The reason that iCloud backups are not encrypted on the user level, is because they tried it and it did not work. Apple said that the problem with giving people their own key, is that if they forget it, they have absolutely no way of getting their information back. Seeing as Apple is a company with very few tech savvy users, the amount of people going into the Apple store, not remembering the key, and getting completely locked out of their information would be extremely high, thus increasing the possibility of lawsuits due to loss of information. So instead, Apple holds the key, and when a user uses 2FA, it unlocks the key. That way, if a user forgets their password, they don’t have too much of a problem, and its much easier to get there data back. Apple does fully encrypt iCloud keychain, and messages in iCloud. However, messages can be stored in a backup. And, Apple does give you the option to plug your device into a computer, and do a local back up that is 100% encrypted, if you think it’s necessary.
Also, Tim Cook has said that they are working on a form of encryption that is more user friendly. So calm down
 
The only trade-off for Gmail is privacy of course.
... which is a bit like saying, "we've found a perfect planet for colonization, the only drawback is the temperature is 1000°." (Then it's not the perfect planet, unless you have a very odd definition of "perfect", or "planet".)

Also, who willingly uses a webmail interface these days? Arguing that Google has the best webmail interface ... to my ears it sounds like the Windows folks who would boast about how fast their machine could boot, while Mac users were thinking, "who boots any more, you just sleep and wake the machine, it's pretty much instant."

To the issue of price, I'd much rather use something that has a clear funding model, so I can count on it staying around, and not trying to sell my information or access to me. I find iCloud's spam filtering and reliability to be more than good enough. Eh, YMMV.
 
Because it is simply the best option. Google has richer content, free storage is larger than any "alternative" and offers you more, you can create blogs, host, share, collaborate, edit remotely, use full-blown spreadsheet and word processor.

Google leads in storage, email, mapping, services, searches, and yes, it is free for the end user. Can you get it now?
I never thought I'd be saying this....

Except the 800-lb Gorilla gives away Office Online: https://products.office.com/en-us/free-office-online-for-the-web

And free E-mail: https://outlook.live.com/owa/

If you buy Office you get 1TB of OneDrive included.

The place I work went from Exchange/Outlook to Gmail. It sucks. The usability is horrible, the functionality is not that great and it's really not geared for large volumes of e-mail (no folders, only tags). It's not just me but a common complaint from lots of us of all age groups.

Google Docs are good for basic editing but they still need to work on more complex documents. I'd much rather use Office Online.
 
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