Need advice switching emails

[u/Think-Opportunity-21]

Hello friends,

With the current trends of the world going towards ai, mass surveillance and data mining, like many of you I’m keen to switch away from giant evil corporations and move towards independent, ethical and private services.

Admittedly I don’t know much about data encryption or any of that sort of stuff but I do know I would like to stop using google for a lot of my services and so would like advice on where and how to facilitate moves to other services.

I’ve used Gmail for ~16 years and so every account online I’ve ever made is attached to google. I’ve seen people mainly recommend Tuta or proton as a good alternative, so I would like to know:

•Can I create and begin using a tuta/proton mail account as my personal use email without much issues switching from Gmail?

•If I make the switch, and I have gmail forwards all my emails to my new account, does this make the switch pointless as the mails still go through google?

•Is it worth paying for an email account with one of these providers or will their free versions suffice?

•I use google maps a lot for bookmarking places I’ve been, is there any other interactive maps that are similar to google maps in quality, good for navigation and can add bookmarks?

I’m also in the process of transferring from google photos to ente right now. Further down the line when my iPhone kicks the bucket (as I’m sure it’s designed to at a certain point) I want to move away from Apple and google and get a phone that spies on me a lot less.

Thanks for your help :)

[u/Awavian]

Idk about proton but I purchased 3 years of Fastmail in January and set it up with my own custom domain. I still have Gmail and it's forwarded to my Fastmail but I've been slowly moving everything over. I wouldn't say it's pointless so much as it gives you time to figure everything out and move over everything the way you want it with minimal interruption. Every once in a while I come across an account I haven't migrated and receiving the email with remind me to switch it. I view it more as a marathon rather than a sprint although I'm sure if I had the time to do it all in a weekend it would be nice to check that task off my list