VLC! No ads ever, that’s insane!
But does it whip the llama’s ass?
I think not.
- this is a really old Winamp reference for you younger folks.
VLC isn’t a WinAmp replacement? Though.
Foobar2000 is!
Foobar themes and customisation was and still is absolutely amazing.
I love my minimalist black version, but now I’m curious! Do you have any examples of cool themes/customizations?
To piggyback off of this, consider donating to VLC.
Donated!
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I’ve never thought about it, how do they make money? I’ve never seen an ad or sent them money.
They make a large amount from Google paying them to be the default search engine. Also they have been making additional projects that can be subscribed to as add-ons for Firefox (like a VPN and an email forwarding service that allows you to make fake email addresses or phone numbers to use on sites that will forward the messages to your real inbox/phone). You can use a limited version of the email thing without paying though so it is easy to try out. And they are always ready to take donations of any size and can be reoccurring. I personally pay .99/month for the email service even though I don’t use it often. As it is nice to have if I need it, and it is basically a donation at that point. lol.
Here are links to those products if you care to read more about them or at least see pricing.
https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/products/vpn/But even just making a point to donate some one-offs here and there does help in small ways to keep a real option in browsers that isn’t just another Chromium-based project.
https://donate.mozilla.org/en-US/Everyone hated when IE was the only browser that sites were coded for, and we are seeing more and more Chromium only sites. Which means a bad vulnerability in Chromium will impact all the browsers based on it. Also privacy add-ons for Firefox tend to work better and block ads well.
I donate every. single. month.
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Donations
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Getting payed by google to make it their default search engine.
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Mainly a non profit
Mozilla seems to be pretty transparent. You can see their financial statement at State of Mozilla.
Bitwarden is one I use several times a day. They do have a support plan for like $10 a year that gives a couple extra features like TOTP support, but the base level is incredibly robust. It’s open source, too. I know a lot of folks also host their own servers with Vaultwarden, but that’s a little beyond my skill level.
FYI, This product is 100% marketed on Lemmy for a profit. I’ve seen astroturfed threads multiple times now.
Free app marketed for profit… There might be something wrong with you
It kinda does feel like it’s being promoted here, which seems unnecessary for a free, open-source program hahaha
Might just be because people really like it and want to share.
I don’t doubt that! I’ve just seen it mentioned a LOT, much more than any other sites I’ve visited.
I’m not suspicious about it anymore, though—if it wasn’t a free open-source program, that would be a different story! Spotting obvious ads disguised as comments everywhere on Reddit was always fun.
I kinda thought that too, but it’s free and open-source… so that would be weird.
Looking into password managers, though, it does really seem like the best choice. Lastpass had breach lately, KeePass requires self-hosting, and other offerings cost more (and aren’t open-source.)
I pay for it just because it’s cheap and to support them
It’s so cheap! The value for the price is astounding.
I pay for it just because it’s cheap and to support them
I did this too when it first came out, and then the product became robust enough that I recommended we implement it at work because secrets management was non-existent. We have a bunch of licenses on the Enterprise plan now and it just keeps getting better each update.
My only complaint is that migrating the data to a new server is a pain in the ass and never works correctly, even when following the migration instructions to the letter. Always have to open a ticket with them for that. Not enough of a pain to move to another product, though.
I also still pay for my personal plan. It really is a fantastic product.
Oh wow, is it really cheap?! Good much money can I invest right away?!? 11?!1111!
Great I do the same too!
Same, the free tier is so good that I’m paying to make sure it stays free.
I just recently started using their totp function and I can’t believe I didn’t switch sooner. Just the fact alone that it automatically copies the code to your clipboard is such a Time saver not having to open up a separate app.
It’s a wild time saver. I can’t believe other folks go to a whole separate app for their codes! Hitting Ctrl+L to autofill passwords and user names then Ctrl+V for TOTP feels like a hack when I watch other people struggle with their other solutions.
I use a separate app for my codes, if someone somehow gains access to my Bitwarden if they have TOTP as wellcthrn they have all my accounts. With my TOTP in another app they still can’t access them.
What do you use?
Not OP but, consider using something like a YubiKey or similar hardware key for your second factor authentication.
They usually support multiple protocols so you only need to carry one around - and storing your second factor with your passwords is like putting all your eggs in one basket.
Print out recovery codes or get an ekstra hardware key for backup and you get great security for surprisingly little effort.
Right! I was using Authy so I didn’t have to grab my phone every time, but even that was still having to open the Authy app and wait for it to load, copy+paste. But using the keyboard shortcuts for Bitwarden is just so fast. Like you said, feels like a hack. It even auto copies on Android and with the autofill, makes it so easy.
Taking the opportunity to get on my soapbox and remind everyone that free software still requires someone’s time and effort to maintain. If you’ve been using a free app for a while and you and you enjoy it (and you have the means to do so), consider sending a donation to the developers/maintainers! It’s a good way to help ensure that the great, free app you enjoy stays great and free.
Or, if you don’t pay for the product, you are the product.
Totally agree. I donate to projects already but I need to do it more.
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It seems evident that the effort put into a comment would mirror one’s investment in the topic. With these bare minimum answers I always assume the quality of the recommendation matches.
With a catch: If it’s something absurdly popular, then no. Something like Google Maps, you really don’t have to say why it’s both surprising and unsurprising that it manages to be ad free. The whole conversation is self-evident and no more words are needed.
Have you considered asking the question yourself and explaining in your post that you are seeking for actual recommendations instead of expecting them in a post with a one-line random question like this one? Maybe?
Most “ITT people” love to help with “ITT” matters, but also enjoy throwing quick answers in posts like this. Just a heads-up.
I don’t know if this will show up or is already in the list, but: Rufus. I burn all my thumb drives for os installs with Rufus. It also lets me bypass a lot of the windows garbage that they’ve tracked on to the installer, like making you sign in to a Microsoft account to install. Also, Ventoy. It’s a multiple OS installer, so one big thumb drive lets me install any number of OSes from it.
While I’m setting up those OSes, ninite gets me my windows programs, and Snappy Driver Installer Origin gets me my drivers. No more laptops with pre-installed bloat for me!
7-zip
Microsoft is adding extensive archive format support (using libarchive) to Windows 11. I’d like to thank 7-zip for its service over the decades, though.
Yes, I totally paid for WinRar.
It’s said that when Jesus comes back, you get to go to heaven if you paid for it.
The three people who did are going to be pretty lonely.
Bitwarden and firefox
I don’t use it but blender is another one
total commander (file manager + ftp/sftp client) for android,
openvpn
I used OpenVPN for years and deployed it across numerous places I worked and at home, amazing project. I feel a bit guilty for switching to wireguard a couple years back but it really is amazingly fast.
So much software is so necessary that I cannot believe it is NOT free.
That doesn’t make any sense. Necessity is the driving factor for it to cost money
Except for basic human rights
sir this is a capitalism
I believe that the only basic human right is the right to participate and function in your local society (whatever that means to your individual situation). In other words, you dont really have the innate right to anything, but you absolutely have the right to participate and receive the amount of benefit from others that you provide to them. For better or worse (and im not going to argue about it) the way we do that today, in this society, is currency.
Except any job should be paid.
Limiting myself to free as in freedom (no ads, not free to use because you are the product): KeePass/KeePassXC, GnuCash, Firefox, LibreOffice, digiKam, GIMP.
Digikam runs on my old thinkpad and handles hundreds of photos a session without batting the proverbial eye. It really is fantastic.
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One I use every day is ShareX.
Couldn’t believe how convenient it is the first time I used it. Fantastic app.
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OsmAnd. Navigated me through numerous countries on holiday. Found us places to eat. So useful it persuaded me to start updating the map locally to help any fellow travelers
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Joplin notes. Use this every day without fail
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Nextcloud. Self hosted cloud that Ive come to rely on
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Signal and Weawow. Although I have donated since they are wonderful apps IMO.