I always get my fiver a day. Not fruits and vegetables. I mean the “Big Five” technology companies (Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Microsoft, Meta (Facebook) and Apple), which have their fingerprints on almost every aspect of my daily life. And probably yours too, because their digital infrastructure underpins a significant portion of the internet.
“Easy,” I thought when I decided to start a 24-hour Big Tech crash diet. Anyone can avoid shopping on Amazon for a day and replace their smartphone with a flip phone. I don’t have to give up All technology, just escape the Big Five giants. Of course I’m wrong; this is impossible. It’s only when you try to get around them that it becomes clear just how much of a monopoly these companies have on our digital lives. I had no idea that the Netflix streaming service, my online banking, or the news sites I visit every day were all hosted by them or used their technology.
To draw attention to the monopoly of tech giants, an American charity called the Project on Economic Security has created “Big Tech Detective”, a free browser add-on that allows you to track and avoid any website that uses technology from Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft. and Google. I start by installing it on my laptop. Its purpose is to allow users to see for themselves how much of the internet infrastructure relies on just four or five companies.
At first, Big Tech Detective works well; In fact, it works so well that surfing the internet is almost impossible. In fact, the results are surprising. Every website I try to visit to do research using the search bar in Chrome with Big Tech Detective installed crashes because it uses resources provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google, Facebook, or Microsoft. This includes news sites such as: Telegram. I was banned from using emails and Google Docs, the tool I normally use to write articles.
I cheerfully explain to an editor to whom I owe work that because I’m on a “Big Tech diet” I’ve missed his email and can’t access any of the programs we use to produce this paper. It soon becomes clear that it would be completely impossible to do my job, or pretty much any job that requires email or word processing software, without Big Tech. After a fruitless hour or so of browsing (or trying to navigate) an internet that didn’t involve Big Tech, it became clear that the internet was really built on just four or five companies.
I’m not the first person to try living independently of Big Tech. In 2019, tech reporter Kashmir Hill embarked on a six-week mission to cut tech giants out of her life and find alternatives. He used a custom-built VPN (virtual private network) to block Big Tech companies one by one and found it impossible.
“Much of the digital world has become inaccessible,” he wrote. “I began to think of Amazon and Google as providers of the infrastructure of the internet, so integrated into the architecture of the digital world that even their competitors had to rely on their services.” When he blocked Google, the entire internet slowed down because almost every site relied on Google to track its users or provide fonts.
Lawmakers are acutely aware of the dominance of tech giants. This week the EU launched investigations into Apple, Google and Meta under the Digital Markets Act (DMA), the landmark law that gives the EU license to rein in Big Tech if it suspects those companies have an unfair advantage over rivals.
Last year, Brussels designated six companies as “watchdogs” that deserve extra regulation: Amazon, Alphabet, Apple, Meta, Microsoft and TikTok owner ByteDance. If they are found not to comply with the DMA, they face fines worth billions of euros.
Similarly, there are concerns about the dominance of tech giants in the UK. In October last year, Ofcom referred the public cloud infrastructure services market to the Competition and Markets Authority following an investigation that found the main cloud providers (Amazon and Microsoft, which have a combined 70-80 per cent market share) were using restrictive features. competition.
But I continue my quest: To continue my quest (I’m in a 5pm-5pm window), I swap my SIM card for a retro Nokia 2660 flip phone. This is pleasantly nostalgic for the first five minutes, then very annoying as it takes me a few minutes to meticulously tap into a short message. Frankly, my Apple iPhone is dead, as are all the apps I use to save and waste time in my daily life. These include: Google Maps, Gmail, Instagram (owned by Meta), Podcasts and, embarrassingly, Candy Crush.
Uber isn’t owned by one of the Big Five companies, but it does use Google Maps, so that doesn’t apply either. Non-Big Tech social media platforms like Bluesky have also emerged, but they’re not much fun if none of your friends are on them. Luckily I have an upgraded version of Snake on my Nokia to keep me busy on the subway.
Entertainment options are also limited: streaming services like Netflix and Disney+ are limitless, as they both use Amazon cloud technology. Obviously like Amazon Prime Video. My new Nokia doesn’t have a touchscreen or any “smart” functionality, and as I light up my iPhone screen to check WhatsApp messages, I find myself absent-mindedly touching it with my finger on the table. breaking news alerts.
The next morning, all of my usual commuting activities, like browsing the news, listening to podcasts, or listening to music on Spotify, are off-limits. While Spotify isn’t technically one of the “Big Tech” five, it does use Google cloud software (a running theme). I buy a physical piece of paper to read the headlines using my plastic debit card, which is not used much these days because I rely on Apple Pay. So far so good, but I still need to try to get through an analog workday.
Even if you actively avoid Amazon, Google, and Microsoft’s products and services, their technology is still in the DNA of nearly every website on the planet. Not only is Amazon responsible for 65 to 70 percent of online marketplace sales in the United States, it is also the world’s largest provider of cloud technology, with a 31 percent market share. I want to know what percentage of global search traffic goes through Google, but ironically I can’t search on Google because I’ve been banned. (The answer is 91 percent, if you’re interested.)
Technically I’m cheating a bit because I’m stuck in the Apple ecosystem and I also have an Apple computer, without which I’d have to write this article by hand. (I tried, but concluded that writing 1,200 words would take about eight hours and I would miss the deadline. Also, I don’t think my editor would appreciate me handing it in in a pile of Biro scribbled notebook pages.)
Given that the Big Tech diet makes surfing the internet nearly impossible, Big Tech Detective’s goal seems to be to draw attention to the issue rather than solve it. Even the alternatives rely on tech giants: ironically, privacy-focused alternative search engine DuckDuckGo has been blocked for using technology from Google and Microsoft. Out of curiosity, I tried Apple’s website and found that even it relies on Google’s resources.
I’m glad this is just a 24-hour crash course in Big Tech veganism and that I can go straight back to being a carnivore and be satisfied with the ease of digital addiction. I’m ashamed to admit that I rushed home after a day spent desperate for the digital riches of my smartphone. A life without tech giants may be possible, but I’m not ready to go off-grid.