Streamlining

So, I started making lists of what I’ve signed up for on annual plans:

• 1Password: $59
• Backblaze: $118
• Calendly: $144
• CodePen: $96
• Dropbox: £95
• Fantastical: £59
• Fastmail: $120
• Grammarly: $139
• Hey: $99
• Plausible: $96
• Nova: $58
• Sketch: $144

And what I pay for monthly:

• Adobe Creative Cloud: Too much
• ChatGPT: £20
• Kit: $49
• Midjourney: $12
• SendOwl: $18

Then, I checked European alternatives for non-US, possibly cheaper options to the services I use.

What’s staying

There are some services I won’t want to change. The peace of mind Backblaze provides is worth its weight in gold. I back up all my media, photos, and work archives to it. I need CodePen for article and book examples.

Nova is by far the nicest code editor, and Sketch is indispensable. Finally, SendOwl handles my digital product sales, so it’s staying on my list to keep. Then, there’s Fantastical, a nice-to-have. It’s much nicer than Apple’s calendar app, so it’s staying for now.

What’s going

As for what to let go: 1Password is Canadian, not American, but there are now plenty of alternative password managers, including Apple’s Passwords app and Switzerland-based Proton Pass.

I set up Calendly for mentoring and meeting bookings, but I don’t use it enough to warrant spending money on it. It will be gone when my annual subscription expires.

I’ve been a Dropbox customer since the beginning, and while £95 isn’t an unreasonable amount for temporary file storage and Paper, I can replace it with Proton Drive.

Fastmail has handled my business email for years, but I can move that to Proton Mail. Likewise, Hey, which I set up to separate my business and personal email, can go too. Proton has a single annual fee, including Proton Drive, Mail, a VPN, and more.

Grammarly will be tougher to move away from as I use it whenever and whatever I write. So before my subscription expires, I’ll disable it and try Language Tool, which is an EU-based free alternative.

Plausible is an EU company, but as I rarely check my website analytics, $96 per year is steep. I’ll be replacing it with Simple Analytics, which has a free tier.

I use ChatGPT and Midjourney, but I will drop to a free or cheapest plan unless I need them more often or for a specific project. Then, I’ll fork out for a month ad hoc.

Kit (formerly ConvertKit) is my current email newsletter provider. It’s good, but too expensive for the benefits I get from it. So, I’m exploring other options, including using the newsletter feature that comes with my Squarespace store.

That leaves Adobe Creative Cloud, which I resent paying for more than anything else.

I can replace Illustrator with Affinity Designer, which I already have. I can switch from InDesign to Affinity Publisher, which I already use, and from Photoshop to Affinity Photo. As for Premier, I bought Final Cut a few years ago but haven’t used it. So, I plan to wean myself off Adobe apps over the next three months and cancel Creative Cloud in July.

Back to my list of what’s going or staying:

• Adobe Creative Cloud: Switch to Affinity
• 1Password: Cancel
• Backblaze
• Calendly: Cancel
• ChatGPT: Ad hoc
• CodePen
• Dropbox: Switch to Proton Drive
• Fantastical
• Fastmail: Switch to Proton Mail
• Grammarly: Switch to Language Tool
• Hey: Cancel
• Kit: Cancel
• Midjourney: Ad hoc
• Plausible: Switch to Simple Analytics
• Nova
• SendOwl
• Sketch

So, that’s where I’ve ended up. A bit less going out each month, and more of it staying this side of the Atlantic.