Work_life on Jeremy's Variety Hour

Modern Data Ownership: Online

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 01:04:30 +0000

Overview

A guide to this segment of the series:

Domain/Hosting
File Storage (Dropbox/Google Drive/OneDrive, etc.)
Shareable Content/Blogs
Passwords
Bookmarks
Email

I’ll present each section with a description of a part of your digital life (you may not have thought of), and then a solution that I have explored myself.

Overview / Background

If you read part 2, “Modern Data Ownership: Local”, you might be thinking, “Oh, they are going to talk about putting my multimedia library online! I can listen to my Jellyfin music and watch my shows on the go!”

I am NOT a cybersecurity expert. Except for a very small chance, you dear reader are probably not a cybersecurity expert either. :)

I will never suggest exposing anything on your home network to the open internet. If you believe you need to, there are many articles out there that will give you that information, I will sleep better at night not giving you that.

Critical Notes

This part of the mini-series is more advanced. Most of this, for true/complete privacy and data control, will require you to run your own server that is on the internet. (but not connected to your home network) You must take extra care. With time, patience, learning, and a small amount of money (i spend $6USD a month as of this article) it is possible.

Alternately, many of the topics discussed here have paid-for hosting options. The software is open source/free, but they make money by managing the internet server part for you. You give them a credit card, set up your account, and you have the service going. (this is my true happy place with open source, a company making the software for free, and then charging for their activities like hosting, the community can contribute, everyone benefits, but you can still run it yourself if you put the effort in)

My Hosting Setup

Because I use the server for myself (not a hosted service for multiple people), I have a very simple set up:

Single, shared CPU
2GB of RAM(memory)
20GB virtual hard drive
Ubuntu Linux for the OS
Manual backups

With the virtual host that I chose, Kamatera (affiliate link / regular link), at the time of this article this is $6USD per month. Clearly this doesn’t have hundreds of gigs for file storage (but some data storage), or the ability to handle thousands of web pages per second. Fortuantely, i don’t have those needs, so my little server on the internet can be simple.

Something i have learned during 30 years of IT: Don’t overengineer at the beginning, make a reasonable start and see what you need. Expand/scale up when appropriate.

This has worked well for me, as I don’t work on medical devices and I am not in charge of Amazon. Those types of areas need a more comprehensive and strategic approach than “just start small”. :) This was a good place to start, and has served me well for several years now. I might increase memory or add a second shared CPU if i notice that it is struggling, but I can grow it as I need to.

Domain / Hosting

If you are hosting things for yourself/your family, it is more fun to have your own domain. You already know my domain, you are visiting it right now. :) I’ve had mine since 1998. A domain is generally two-three parts. The main part you choose, kennebel for mine, and the part that indicates what type of domain it is, possibly the country it is part of, just .com for mine.

The reason it helps to have a domain, is that you can more easily break up the different services we’ll be talking about in to easy to remember names. For example, my website is on kennebel.com, and what will be discussed later the service i set up to manage my links is, not so creatively, found at links.kennebel.com, which you’ll see discussed lower down, then something like files.yourdomain.com for a Google Drive/OneDrive/Dropbox alternative, etc.

For this, you need a “registrar”, or a company that has special rights to sell and manage domain names. THey will help you search for available names, and provide pricing of what it will cost to own the domain name.

You should do research on the registrar you chose, to make sure they align with your values. The company I chose is called Hover (affiliate link / regular link), and while they have several services, i use them for the domain registration and DNS. (DNS converts domain names to server addresses, when you put a server on the internet, it is given a numerical address, but a domain is easier to remember, and you can move it around if you build new servers)

File Storage

A very common data activity for people is file and photo storage. On more than one occasion, major file storage vendors have put out notices that they accidentally had a problem with their service that made every single file available to anyone with no security restrictions, sometimes up to several hours. This is outside of the normal total access that the vendors enjoy over every single file you store on their system.

For these types of activities, there is an open source system called Nextcloud.

THis works very similar to Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, Dropbox, and others. It can store your files, you can share from the server to others, manage your photos, and more. There are programs you can download for your computer (Linux, Mac, and Windows), as well as mobile (Android and iOS). These programs make it easy to keep files synchronized across systems, and backed up somewhere outside of your local device.

Of course, be cautious about what you store, it is a device on the internet, and with enough time, every device on the internet can be broken in to.

Shareable Content/Blogs

There has been a lot of activity on shared blogging/article style platforms. Unfortunately, some of that activity is platform owners giving voices to people that violently disagree with other types of people existing. One of the reasons I chose WordPress over a multi-user blogging platform was mostly about making sure i would agree with the person in charge. (usually anyways…) It is more difficult to monetize and gain an audience with an isolated blog rather than being on a “discover” feed, but that is a trade off i was okay with.

WordPress has many, many plugins for all sorts of uses, and the code is scrutinized by a lot of people, helping it keep honest.

2026-05 Update: I have since switched to Hugo Static Site Generator. Wordpress had a lot more going on than I needed. A static site generator comes with higher maintenance effort, but higher security as well.

Passwords

THis is a bit more tricky than the other topics. Secure password storage is important, so that you can use longer, hard to remember passwords for banking, and other activities.

In the past, there was KeePass/KeePassXC/others for offline (or local network) password storage. This worked well for personal use, or a small team use inside of a corporate network. There are open source options that you can host yourself for online/shared password storage, like Bitwarden. Referring back to the top of this article, you are not (likely) a cybersecurity expert, and password storage being breached would be a serious issue for most people.

It is of course possible for the corporations that host password managers like LastPass/1Password/Keeper/others to be hacked, but they have dedicated cybersecurity staff, fiscal responsibilities, and other resurces that normal people don’t have. If you are only working on your home entwork there are options, but if you are going to store your most sensitive passwords, you should have some professional support behind you. (that is my opinion)

Bookmarks

(on to a happier topic)

Not too long ago, i went through a series of different browsers, looking for something that was compatible with websites I used, respected my privacy, and felt easy to use. This really disrupted my bookmarks/favorites. It also made me think about who had access to my bookmarks when I clicked that easy “sync now” button in the browser.

My research brought me to Linkwarden and their self-hosted option. THe tool has Android and iOS apps for saving links, as well as browser extensions for Chrome and Firefox based browsers. Now, no matter what I use, my bookmarks are stored in a single place I manage. This tool also has additional features like grabbing a copy of the page you bookmark and storing it in the app. THis way, if the site disappears or is offline, you still have a copy of the content.

It also has a neat feature that you can share links, like the following: Kennebel “Public - Data Ownership” Links

Email

This is another one of those more complicated topics. It is possible for you to run your own email server, there are many open source options that you can download and install.

The complex part of hosting your email is not the server setup itself or the security concerns of making sure your server is not taken over by a mass-email spammer, oddly enough. It has to do with getting email from your server delivered to everyone else. Other email vendors take a “guilty until proven innocent” approach to unknown email servers.

If you do nothing else besides setting up the email program on your hosted server somewhere in the world, most likely all of your messages will be pre-emptively marked as “probably junk”, if not rejected outright. It is a long process that you need to go through to prove your server is safe and not a source of junk mail. (and possibly an on-going thing to keep proving your server is safe)

Alternately, you can work with a known good provider where you can have your custom domain email to be delivered. You need to do a bit of research to make sure they are not scanning your email for advertising or AI training purposes. Some places to start your research might be Proton or Fastmail for a provider. The choices many people use (and something i’m working to get off of) are typically Gmail or Microsoft Outlook. The challenges there as what I listed already, regarding the scanning of messages not for security reasons, but money making ones.

First overview article can be found: here

Previous article about local items: here

Final summary article will be found: ( here eventually )

Modern Data Ownership: Local

Tue, 17 Mar 2026 04:29:19 +0000

Overview

A guide to this segment of the series:

Your Home Computers
Browser
Multimedia (music, movies, TV shows)
Your devices (TV, fridge, other smart devices)
Home Automation

I’ll present each section with a description of a part of your digital life (you may or may not have thought about), and then a solution that I have explored myself.

My Home Setup

I have a couple of laptops, some TV streaming devices, and a refurbished corporate desktop computer that functions as my home server. (the desktop-turned-server is in no way exposed to the internet, I am not a cybersecurity expert and am not going to risk exposing my private network like that)

Your Home Computers

Starting at the beginning, if you still have a laptop or desktop computer, is the operating system that you use to access everything. I have very little experience with Apple computers, and can only speak to Windows and Linux.

Starting with Windows 10, they ramped up the data being captured, and the advertising intrusion compared with previous versions. Windows 11 puts all previous efforts to shame. Advertising is being done in the start menu and elsewhere, there are regular articles about how to turn off the data being captured and sent back to Microsoft, and the latest nail in this data privacy coffin are the AI training and agent.

The most recent AI additions to the operating system are so dangerous, that for now they are not turned on by default and they come with warnings about how they can be used to upload all of your data to hackers, install viruses, and there is no way for Microsoft to protect against it. (but they still deployed the feature to millions of computers…)

Link to article: article

THe solution, Linux, requires being willing to learn new computer skills and new ways of using your computer to take control of your privacy. There are many user friendly versions of Linux, and installation is usually just a few technical steps, and surprisingly little time. Installing Windows 11 on one of my laptops took me several hours even though I’ve done it many times before. Installing a Linux operating system was under 20 minutes on the exact same computer.

Don’t be worried if changing the operating system is a step too far beyond your comfort zone, it is not for everyone. Most, if not all, of the relevant open source options discussed in this series can be achieved on Windows (and probably Mac). There are many articles online about locking down Windows as much as you are allowed to. Most people do not want to change how they use a computer, for example, even switching between the maor players of Windows and Mac. You just have to be aware of the privacy trade offs involved and staying vigilant with whatever option you choose.

Browser / Search

One of, if not the most, used application for people is a browser. Unfortunately, the people that make browsers know this, and are continuously adding in tracking features. Some browsers give you settings to control the tracking and AI features, but usually only after the community calls them out. Then you have to remember to go in each time there is an update to verify the settings stay the way you want.

Here is a brief list of browsers that put privacy first:

Vivaldi - A lot of features, based on the same technology as Chrome and Edge, which makes it very compatible with most of the internet
Waterfox - This uses the same underlying technology as Firefox, but has a focus on privacy
DuckDuckGo - This is only available for Windows and Mac, no Linux unfortunately, made by the same people as the DuckDuckGo search engine

Searching is another important item to watch out for. The activity can be tracked, reported to authorities, and sold all without your knowledge, permission, or any compensation back to you.

Here are a few search engines you can try out that do not track your search activity. (you can change your browser default search engine in the settings):

Multimedia

Most people, including myself, switched to streaming services over physical media over the years. The convenience, the large selections, the ease of switching between movies/shows, the platforms remember where you left off, and many other features.

Disclaimer: Please be sure to follow the local laws where you are regarding copying discs.

A number of challenges have arisen with streaming platforms:

Limited catalogs depending on your interests (have to subscribe to several for a complete list of items you want to watch)
Platforms take shows offline, or only put shows up during certain times of year
Watching history is tracked (and probably not kept to themselves)

Enter an open source project I found that gives you a streaming platform like interface that you can host yourself: Jellyfin

The catalog of movies/shows is exactly what you want (based on your disc collection)
You control if something leaves
What you watch is not tracked by anyone (except yourself)

There is some set up work that you need to do of course, but being in control of your own media is great.

You need to have somewhere to host the Jellyfin software, a computer with a lot of available hard drive space
You will need a disc drive, something that can play DVD and Blu-Ray if you have both types of discs
You will need to install some software to “rip” (copy) from the disc to the computer:
- One option is a tool called MakeMKV
- Another is Handbrake
You will need your physical discs
- Thrift stores can be good for picking up inexpensive movies and shows.
- One thrift store near me has a tiny handful of options. Another has many shelves of discs, quite a variety.

As you convert your discs to digital format, and rename/relocate the files according to the Jellyfin requirements, you will start to build your very own streaming platform in your home. The interface should feel very comfortable for anyone that has used the major streaming platforms.

Jellyfin is capable of hosting movies, TV shows, music, and eBooks. There are native client programs for Linux, Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Roku, Chromecast, and others. AppleTV doesn’t have a native client oddly, but there is a commercial/paid tool called Infuse that can run on AppleTV and connect to Jellyfin.

Disclaimer: Please be sure to follow your local laws regarding copying discs.

Your Devices

Many devices are starting to demand wifi access after you open the box. WHile I cannot advise on individual products, I would urge caution on connecting anything to the internet that you don’t absolutely need to. Carefully weigh the benefits they claim you will get, with the knowledge that the device will report data back to the manufacturer.

The devices will want updates over time. Many of them will even have time delay updates. TVs have been known to operate one way for 90-ish days (past a return date), then run updates and the user interface becomes more hostile to use (ads and so forth).

Devices with microphones or cameras send data back to the manufacturer. A popular doll with a micrphone and “speak back” features was discovered to be saving recordings of children on a central set of servers. A robot vacuum with a camera for obstacle avoidance, was saving photos of people’s houses and sending the information back to the manufacturer, as well as a certain car company that has a car with cameras all around was sending images of garages back.

Home Automation

Several months ago, i received a notice that the smart outlets and switches i was using around the house were going to be discontinued because the manufacturer got bored of running the servers they set up to handle the automation schedules. That meant every single one was about to become e-waste, and i’d have to go without or buy a whole new manufacturer (and possibly face the same situation again later).

Fortunately, after some digging around, i discovered an open source project called: Home Assistant

Once I installed this on my home server and completed the set up, it immediately found my smart switches and outlets. It also found some other devices on my network and provided automatic control options for them. Then it was just a matter of recreating my automation schedules, and all of my switches were working normally again.

An amazing side effect that I hadn’t considered before I transitioned to my local server… The old software connected to the manufacturer’s servers, most likely hosted in a data center thousands of miles away on the internet somewhere. THe new software is inside of my house on the same wifi network. Before, when i would tap the button to manually turn a switch on or off, there would be a few seconds delay (sometimes making me think it didn’t work, so i’d tap again right as it switched, so I’d have to hit it a third time). Now the result is nearly instant, much better experience! (I wish i had found and switched a long time ago)

First overview article can be found: here

Next article about online items: here

Final summary article will be found: ( here eventually )

Modern Data Ownership Challenges

Fri, 12 Dec 2025 18:00:00 +0000

Modern software vendors collect a lot of data. On the surface it is to improve their product, determine which features are being used, detect problems before they get too big, and many other reasons. Under the surface, this data can be used for marketing, for sale to other companies (and government agencies), and like the previous point also many other reasons. (there is a whole industry that is thriving called ‘data brokers’ who pay for data and resell it. sometimes the data brokers are even a collaboration between several companies with similar products)

How does this impact me?

The most direct answer is targeted advertising, a way for companies to determine exactly what you are needing/wanting and showing you ads relevant to that as fast as possible.

Companies are also being more aggresive with “dynamic pricing” (or as some news agencies are calling it, ‘surveillance pricing’), where they adjust pricing not based on costs or demand, but based on your zip code, your past shopping habits, your internet searches, and more. Basically, how much they think you’ll be willing to pay.

Some companies offer “price matching”, where if you can show a lower price online, even at their own website, they will give you that price. However, using a technology called geofencing, where they can tell if you are in one of their stores, their website will start showing the in store prices (or higher to make you think the store is a good deal), which might be very different than if you had looked online from your house.

Dynamic pricing is just one example. Another is that some police departments are running searches against license plate readers and internet activity to profile people doing things they don’t want, even if those things are legal in other places.

All of this is possible because of the data companies are collecting all of the time.

What can be done?

The way to take back control in this situation, is to deny the information from companies in the first place. For you as an individual, or as a representative of a company, to keep ownership of your data. It cannot be sold, or used against you, if other people/companies never have it in the first place.

Where you cannot control the data, like on social media sites, you can sometimes select to remove personalized advertising. This reduces the money the social media company makes from the advertisements (targeted ads generate more revenue), and reduces the quality of the data that the advertisers can collect on you (if you see ads for funeral services, prom dresses, and farm tractors while caring about none of that, they will have a harder time building a profile about you).

The hard truth:

The average non-IT person has no chance of completely owning their digital data. Even a technology person cannot take everything back if you are interacting with any online shopping, social media, or similar activities. Just like an average non-car person could never build a modern car with all of the safety features and electronics on their own without a lot of training and time.

Non-IT people who in their everyday lives that are retail workers, accountants, medical staff, sales people, HR folks, and everyone else in the world that doesn’t dream about data centers in their sleep, don’t have the training or time to take complete control of their digital life.

HOWEVER

There has never been a better time to find the parts of your life that you care about, and learn how to start managing it yourself. The tools and knowledge are out there. (some introductory information will be a part of this mini-series of posts) Most tools even let you collaborate with others, without cost, so you can build a community and help each other.

Don’t be afraid to stand up for your data rights, and to find other people that also care about their privacy.

Data Ownership

Everything you do on the computer, on your phone, in a house with smart devices, on the internet… generates data.

Very few people think about what is being captured, who is receiving a copy, and how it is being used. As time goes on, companies are finding ways to capture every possible interaction and portion of data they can. This is for their own use, and for selling to third party data brokers who aggregate the data. The data brokers compare it with data from multiple sources, and then sell the insights to other companies and governments.

In the past, there was a saying, “If you are not paying for something, you are the product, not the customer.” These days, that line has been completely erased. Even if you do pay for a service (directly or through having advertisements shown to you), you are still the product as the companies have decided to sell the additional data generated.

Notes Before We Continue

Reclaiming ownership of your data is not free. There is a lot of time to spend reading and learning. Depending on which topics are important to you, there might be costs for home equipment or online server hosting. This extra cost and effort is what you are presumably paying for with vendors and services. Unfortunately, you are also getting data theft and monetization that you don’t benefit from.

(of course, companies will say it is not data theft, because you agreed to the practice in the terms of service they make mandatory, but that is another discussion)

Most of the software that will be mentioned has free options (if you manage it yourself), or many of the systems have hosting options available. Some Open Source companies configure their business where they release the software for free, but make their money by hosting their own software for you.

Local

This upcoming post will cover topics such as:

Your Home Computers
Browser
Multimedia (music, movies, TV shows)
Your devices (TV, fridge, other smart devices)
Home Automation

Read the article: here

Online

This upcoming post will cover topics such as:

Domain/Hosting
File Storage (Dropbox/Google Drive/OneDrive, etc.)
Shareable Content/Blogs
Passwords
Bookmarks
Email

Read the article: here

Early Conclusion

It is important to learn what is happening. What you can do abhereout it. Where you can’t do something due to time or training limitations, how you can ask the right questions and find reliable vendors that align with your goals.

Ultimately, this is an ever-evolving topic and you have to regularly check in on the vendors you cannot replace, to make sure they stay aligned with your values and goals.

For example, i was using a company for my online hosting needs. Their service and pricing were great, their documentation was excellent. They were promoting their career openings a lot, so I thought i’d take a look. All of their openings at the very bottom said, “All openings are available for remote workers except Colorado. No candidates will be considered from that state.” At the time, Colorado had just passed a law that any company advertising within the state was required to provide a good-faith salary range for any job openings (one of the first in the United States to do this). The hosting company didn’t like that, so they got around the law by excluding candidates from CO. Living in a particular state is not a protected class, so it was their right to make this exception. I immediately took down my server and closed my account. If they didn’t want workers from CO because of a basic pay transperancy law, then i could find a new hosting provider.

Work_life on Jeremy's Variety Hour

Modern Data Ownership: Online

Overview

Overview / Background

Critical Notes

My Hosting Setup

Domain / Hosting

File Storage

Shareable Content/Blogs

Passwords

Bookmarks

Email

Navigation Links

Modern Data Ownership: Local

Overview

My Home Setup

Your Home Computers

Browser / Search

Multimedia

Your Devices

Home Automation

Navigation Links

Modern Data Ownership Challenges

How does this impact me?

What can be done?

Data Ownership

Notes Before We Continue

Local

Online

Early Conclusion