Android without the mothership
I have been running this setup (Cyanogenmod + f-droid, no google apps) for the past 9 months and have been quite happy. I use owncloud for keeping my calendar, contacts, and files sync'ed. K9mail + APG for (signed/encrypted) email. As the article notes OsmAnd is workable, but the what is available through f-droid is 2 versions behind (apparently with low chance of future updates due to difficulties building it).<p>Many apps are open source (e.g., github, wordpress, coinbase, 2FA apps compatible with many services) and so are available through f-droid. Others, like TextSecure are really easy to build from source and install.<p>I have occasionally downloaded apps through one of the APK downloader services mentioned in the article comments -- I've had mixed luck. Some work flawlessly, others don't work at all without the google apps.<p>It would be awesome to see Mozilla's location service [0] integrated into Cyanogen to replace the google location services (which are of course disabled if you don't install google apps).<p>[0] <a href="https://location.services.mozilla.com/" rel="nofollow">https://location.services.mozilla.com/</a>