This week, we were supposed to refrain from all Google products, including such websites as Youtube and Gmail. At first, I was most frightened about not having access to Gmail. I have several accounts that get constant email. But the simplest solution to that was to  forward all of my emails to an Outlook account. This got to be a bit confusing at first, because I was unsure of which emails were directed to whichever address. On the other hand, it was nice to have all of my emails contained in one place.

The second task was the search engine. At first I used Duck Duck Go because of the claim that it does not track your searches. In the surveillance heavy world we live in today, that was a comforting claim. But after a while, it was harder to find the content that I really wanted. I ended up giving up security over convenience and using Bing for the rest of the week.

I found it harder to refrain from Google on my phone. My Gmail app was racking up email notifications and it was hard to ignore the little red number over the app. iPhones tend to be pre-loaded with the Google app, and it was hard to avoid it, especially since I was so used to searching random little things through the day. I ended up cheating during the first Friday, using Google Maps for directions to my doctor’s office in Chinatown. My fear of getting lost overtook me and I depended on the map.

This experiment made me realize how invested we are in Google, how it’s become the standard in many ways on the internet. I really had to make an effort to avoid it, possible due to the fact that I was already invested myself. Being opened up to how watched we are constantly was unsettling, and it is obvious how hard Google pushes to be part of our lives automatically. It is hard to give up convenience for the sake of being completely private.