I use joplin with joplin server running through a reverse proxy in a docker container. I love it. It also supports encryption, so you could use a more convenient service like Google drive and still be assured of your privacy.

There’s a lot of them and I want to browse them from the file explorer on my PC. I’m sure I could accomplish the same by plugging the phone in, but I don’t see the point in that when KDE connect already has the functionality I want.

Cards on the table: for Google money I’d do it too. If they want to enshittify their product until the competition has a fighting chance, who am I to stop them? Sure, it’s an annoying and anticonsumer thing to do. But making a “free” product’s bad qualities harder to circumvent isn’t the ethical hill I’m going to die on.