If you ask on a bluesky or a LinkedIn about experiences in the switch from MessageApp WhatsApp to Signal, you will get enthusiastic responses. If you ask if American apps are switched to European, then a part of the business community responds positively, but the consumer remains silent. Or you get questions back: is there actually a good alternative to Instagram?
Since the re-election of US President Donald Trump and the public statements of support of American Big Tech companies to his ideas, in Europe, we should not even get rid of that American tech infrastructure in Europe? Last month, Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, even called for alternatives to Visa, Mastercard and PayPal.
Time for app -sovereignty, so that we are no longer so dependent on the whimsiness of the US and the power politics of China – it sounds beautiful. But users find it pretty difficult. Where should they go? Why doesn’t a European card app work as smoothly as a Google Maps? And there is hardly anyone on Pixelfed – so how can you continue to earn money as an Instagram influencer?
Difficult questions, without easy answers. “We consciously chose to start with a call to use Signal more,” says Lotje Beek of digital rights organization Bits of Freedom. That MessageApp is better than WhatsApp in terms of privacy, but is ‘just’ American. “Signal is easily accessible, people understand it. Other app alternatives find them a much greater challenge. They are unknown, that scares off.”
User -friendly
The American tech companies have explicitly done their best to make apps as user -friendly as possible. “Google Docs is so easy. An open source alternative is often more difficult to deal with.” While with a transparent word processor such as LibreOffice – manager The Document Foundation is located in Berlin – you are much less dependent on a large tech company.
Despite all the bumps on the road, the demand for European app alternatives has increased in recent months. Unexpected for some app makers. For example, Navigation app Magic Earth was actually intended as a free sign for the business software that Tech company Magic Lane actually sells, says Dutch tech entrepreneur Raymond Alves via a video connection. The unexpected influx of users now causes logistical problems. “If the traffic information in our app is addressed, then it will cost us money. While the app is free.”
Great to do if you have a few tens of thousands of users. But since Trump’s election, the number of downloads from Magic Earth is suddenly raising. “We went from 200,000 users to 800,000 in three months,” says Alves. Mainly growth from European users who no longer want to use Google Maps. Too American, too unreliable. “What do they do with my data,” Alves summarizes.
Now he suddenly has to switch. A revision of the “somewhat clumsy” design of the app is being looked at. And to earnings models. A donation button on the site did not yield enough income, says Alves. Now he investigates whether users are willing to pay an annual cost -effective amount for things such as traffic information.
European consumers are therefore looking for alternatives, even if they are not always put on the market. Helpful the site European Alternatives of the Swiss software developer Constantin Graf – he keeps lists of European apps. These are mostly names that will sound little known, such as Posteo (e-mail), Solidtime (planning and organization of your time), Mullvad (VPN) and Opentalk (Videhochat). The apps often have the same problems: they require technical knowledge, are not integrated with other commonly used apps or simply do not have enough users to replace an American app. But they are there.
Addiction
Diana Krieger from the Dutch email company Soverin felt like “a calling in the desert,” she says. Now that the policy in the United States is becoming increasingly hostile to Europe, many people seem to be over. “I sometimes compare that dependence on American apps with an addiction. We have to get rid of it, but that also means that you have to take some pain, that there is a period that is a bit less.” She means: that users must get used to something more convenient design, or other irritations. Because without influx of users and therefore money, little changes. “We will maintain ourselves that we do not have good app alternatives in Europe.”
But convincing the Gmail user remains difficult. “In the Netherlands we don’t like change.” The American apps ‘work too well’, readers say in a response to a call from NRC On LinkedIn and Bluesky. And how can you easily replace the ‘G-suite’, the extensive collection of Google apps such as Calendar and Docs that are all attuned to each other?
“We get a lot of basic questions from consumers,” says Krieger. “Is it difficult to transfer your e-mail to Soverin? Can I add family to my e-mail account? How many e-mail addresses can I have with you?” In the beginning it all seems like a hassle, she acknowledges. According to her, mainly because other e-mail providers sometimes make switching complicated (for example, you cannot take your e-mail address with you), while she thinks the process is simple. But on the other hand is the answer to another popular question: yes, the servers are in Europe.
The lively Krieger rather speaks about infrastructure than about apps. The Americans, who think bigger about digital infrastructure, she says. But that does not mean that there is nothing going on in Europe. “Look at Nextcloud, Scaleway.” No apps, but server companies that could form the backbone of a European online reality.
What should happen to make that possible? More support from European and Dutch governments, all three experts say NRC Speaked, although Krieger is already seeing improvement there.
Transfer more easily
“The entire Dutch government is still on Microsoft,” says Lotje Beek of Bits of Freedom. But that should be different. “Just look: WiFi was even invented in the Netherlands. Alternatives must be invested, switching must be made easier.” Although Bits of Freedom does not necessarily argue for a fully European app environment. “The point is that a tech company complies with European legislation,” says Beek. She finds it more important that it becomes easier for users to communicate between multiple apps of the same type, the so -called ‘interoperability’.
Diana Krieger also has reservations. The fact that a company is in Europe does not mean that your data is really doing well. “It is currently too complicated for a consumer to find out which app you should be [om je data te bewaken]”She says.” A standard must come for that. “
In any case, the European mentality has to go, Raymond Alves of Magic Lane thinks. “We are too careful now.” He sees the developments in the United States somewhere as a positive push in the right direction. “Everything our big brother did, we walked after that for eighty years. Now we have to stand upright. Can we do that? I think so. But we have to embrace European companies.”