not trying to start a distro war, but I would advise against using ubuntu for the time being as their custodian has been somewhat incompetent in recent years, and they have been forcing users to use their "snap" system. It may give you a bad first experience.
Why does the gov. have its nuts in a twist over a privately-owned timewasting service?
The gov. should use public forms of communication, like their own websites and mailing lists. Why endorse this privitzation of their communcation channels in the first place?
What does it matter? Just use Tor for everything read-only.
If some service requires you to create an account, just give them false information. If they ban you, just create another account. At the end of day, the legalese is irrelevant. If it was relevant, then people would read it.
It is not like the user has any bargaining power with the platform owner to spy on them less for example, or even verify that they are upholding the privacy policy. These companies do not follow their own rules in banning you or otherwise.
I agree with your first statement about hoarding by early buyers.
However, the smug "write-only database meme" is getting a bit old. Cryptocurrencies, and even other crypto-payment systems (e.g. chaumian cash) obviously have different characteristics than centralized money. Come to think of it, you could just mockingly describe any computer program that has structured data as a database.
Cryptocurrency has almost nothing to do with databases or storing data. At its core, cryptocurrency is a system of distributing signed transactions that uses hashcash as a sybil-resistance and (order) synchronisation mechanism.
Google spreadsheets need not apply. The whole point is that you don't require a single party to sign transactions. The problem that cryptocurrency deals with concerns co-operation between adversarial parties. Centralization leaves you hopping from platform to platform forever.