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DuckDuckGo vs Google

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Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#141

Post by notzorbo3 »

kdamken wrote: post #122

I really, really want to like DuckDuckGo. But every single time I’ve switched from Google, I’ve found them to be much worse at returning the best results for what I’m looking for. For example, let’s say I want to look up “ear infection”. Google will spit out a bunch of info right on their results page, often saving me the trouble of even going to another site. DDG however will just give me 10 webmd links. If they wan…

Try startpage.com. I moved away from google a year ago and never looked back. I've never once needed to fall back to google. That's probably because startpage.com is basically anonymized google.

I know we're supposed to root for the entrepreneurs here on HN, but DDG honestly seems like more hype / marketing than a decent product. You never hear anything about startpage.com (maybe because it has a boring name?) but it just works.

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#142

Post by [deleted] »

grepthisab wrote: post #125
Lifesnoozer wrote: post #3

Recently switched over to DuckDuckGo on all my devices. Tried to do the same thing several years ago and found it didn't really work out, but this time around it is so much better, both when it comes to speed and results. If anyone has doubts because they tried it years ago, I'd say go for it again.

Same here. Tried a while back and didn't really take. I found myself Googling most things after DDG'ing them. Tried again recently because I love the mission, and it's working much better. Usually what I want is in the top few results, although Google still does a bit better with search result quality. I see myself using it as my main search engine at this point.

[deleted]

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#143

Post by Semaphor »

unicornporn wrote: post #18

I'm sure DDG works great if you're an American. As someone who has tried a region specific version of DDG though, I can say the results are downright terrible. Some say the DDG bangs are a solution. What do I win by doing that? It only made me resort to !g all the time, because the results were so bad. Now I use https://www.startpage.com/ with region set to Swedish. It's practically a proxy for Google search, so it g…

If I set search to "Germany" in DDG the results are almost always what I want (to be fair, that's usually only shopping related).

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#144

Post by projectant »

laser wrote: post #28

"Google would be an elephant while DuckDuckGo is a mosquito (this is not to emphasize; I’m actually making things better for DuckDuckGo)." Why would this guy go out of his way to say this metaphor is actually literally informative and generous towards DuckDuckGo while apparently having exerted no mental effort and being incorrect by orders of magnitude on his own data? If you're most generous to the writer, you get 1…

I find it funny that engineers ( on HN ? ) put on their I'm-a-rigid-logic-thinking-only-engineer cap when it suits them, and their I'm-an-imaginative-open-eyed-creative-rebel cap when it suits them as well. Traits of the first cap include: can't think outside the exact parameters given them, can't 'fill in the blanks' or inference laterally, take words and numbers to be exact limiting things. Traits of the second cap are basically the opposite of these, we can fill in the blanks, and so on.

I don't notice people wearing both hats at the same time much.

Of course, the OP could be satire. When you can't tell the difference between satire and your platform, then ...

Incidentally, if we look sideways a bit the metaphor fits like: Google isn't just linearly bigger, it has nonlinear increases in advantages because of its size, clout, network effects, and so on. So the order of magnitude discrepancy is perhaps justified by attempting to account for these affects. Conversely, it could be suggesting that smaller disruptive and startups ought to spread their influence virally, parasitically, or through insect-like nimbleness and hatching-of-the-1000-eggs reproduction, instead of relying on slower, more "mammalian" reproduction to propagate their influence. Who knows? Hard to say which interpretation is correct, when words are ambiguous and one leaves it to the imagination. You can't even rely on Occam's razor to decide, since the shortest path between two thoughts differs depending on the mind. But maybe that's not a bad thing. Speech & language is nothing more than successful miscommunication. You can't police what you don't understand.

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#145

Post by Uehreka »

badosu wrote: post #135
alexasmyths wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was one of the most HN comments I've ever read. Hey, it's just a metaphor. Scales and ratios not needed. edit: Wasn't meant to be negative ... as I could see myself writing something like that and my GF giggling at me for a week ...

I agree with parent, it's not just a metaphor but a wildly inaccurate guess that makes the reader think duckduckgo is more irrelevant than it really is. > That was one of the most HN comments I've ever read. What does this mean?

HN has a reputation among some[who?][weasel words] as a place where many commenters are some combination of pedantic, overly literal and out of touch with mainstream culture. Taking this metaphor to pieces would seem to check the first 2 boxes pretty neatly.

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#146

Post by tempay »

badosu wrote: post #135
alexasmyths wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was one of the most HN comments I've ever read. Hey, it's just a metaphor. Scales and ratios not needed. edit: Wasn't meant to be negative ... as I could see myself writing something like that and my GF giggling at me for a week ...

I agree with parent, it's not just a metaphor but a wildly inaccurate guess that makes the reader think duckduckgo is more irrelevant than it really is. > That was one of the most HN comments I've ever read. What does this mean?

I think they mean the tendency to take a statement and apply maths or logic to show that it is incorrect (or less frequently, correct).

I regularly do this (to the frustration of those around me) and I think there is a strong correlation between enjoying hacker news and having this personality trait.

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#147

Post by cbg0 »

badosu wrote: post #135
alexasmyths wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was one of the most HN comments I've ever read. Hey, it's just a metaphor. Scales and ratios not needed. edit: Wasn't meant to be negative ... as I could see myself writing something like that and my GF giggling at me for a week ...

I agree with parent, it's not just a metaphor but a wildly inaccurate guess that makes the reader think duckduckgo is more irrelevant than it really is. > That was one of the most HN comments I've ever read. What does this mean?

> What does this mean?

It means comments around here have a tendency to be overly pedantic and critical.

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#148

Post by notzorbo3 »

Svip wrote: post #23
unicornporn wrote: post #18

I'm sure DDG works great if you're an American. As someone who has tried a region specific version of DDG though, I can say the results are downright terrible. Some say the DDG bangs are a solution. What do I win by doing that? It only made me resort to !g all the time, because the results were so bad. Now I use https://www.startpage.com/ with region set to Swedish. It's practically a proxy for Google search, so it g…

I must say I'm having the reverse experience. I very seldom use its Danish regional setting, but even for Danish searches DDG is fine. It's only 4-5 times a month I need the !g bang. But knowing about Startpage, I now use the !sp bang instead of !g. Indeed, due to the bangs, I know use DDG as my proxy to a lot of other search engines, like Wikipedia (!w/!wda/!w..) and Wiktionary (!wikt), and even obscure ones like Me…

I've never found the bang functionality very useful. Perhaps because Chrome offers that out of the box in the URL bar.

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#149

Post by projectant »

But how good can a search engine be if it does not track its humans, and therefore cannot use browsing / search history as contextual clues for query ranking / semantics ?

It might be very good. But can such a system compete with one that does use search history as context?

Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google

#150

Post by noxToken »

chrisweekly wrote: post #67
BerislavLopac wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So a... duck? ;-)

2 ducks

I did a quick search comparing the mass of a mallard to a Canadian goose (default options returned for 'weight of duck' and 'weight of goose'). A large mallard on avg is about 3.5 lbs, and a small Canadian goose on average is about 7.1 lbs. In this case, yes! Two ducks == 1 goose.
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