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The world needs more search engines

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Re: The world needs more search engines

#141

Post by skyfaller »

pcmaffey wrote: post #41

I want to see niche search engines: - a search engine for blogs - a search engine for dev questions - a search engine for shopping - a search engine for diy etc. Im really tired of sites trying to centralize and own this content. The key to decentralizing and empowering individuals to own their content is enabling distribution and discovery. New search engines are essential to the web we want.

Anyone remember Technorati when it had a blog search engine? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technorati I recently noticed one of my old blog posts had Technorati tags in it, and that was a blast from the past. http://consumingexperience.com/2005/02/technorati-tags-intro...

I'm pretty sure that we won't see a significant blog search engine again until blogs regain some of the power they lost to social media.

Re: The world needs more search engines

#142

Post by paul7986 »

keepper wrote: post #71

It’s really sad to see the anti-success rhetoric. I was around during the “search wars”, and what’s usually forgotten is that well, they were by far the best behaved as a corporate entity. This “romantization” of this ideal state, devoid of historical context or acknowledgement of the world we live in is extremwly counter productive. Should google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple do better? Absofuckinglutely!!! Regulate them…

As Google has gotten bigger it seems to forgotten its motto of "Do No Evil," and done the total opposite for the sake of profits!

It was an inspirational company and story that many rooted for due to its culture and mission.

Re: The world needs more search engines

#143

Post by smolder »

dmix wrote: post #77
cdumler wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generally speaking, empires are negative entities. The work because they took advantage of being first (or first to be successful) and used that advantage to absorb the wealth of those they conquer. While a lot of productive things can come out of such an environment, at its heart the empire is sustained by consumption. When there is less to conquer, there is less wealth available for the wealthy, but the desires of…

Wealth isn't some finite quantity that is merely taken or traded between a group of individuals. This is highly ignorant of economics and is a worldview that sadly what drives a lot of hysteria around wealth inequality (that when one person has more wealth it means they deprived it from another person who would have had it otherwise, combined with the idea it just sits there in a bank account not being used or it's a…

It is not a given that massive wealth accumulation involves depriving others of wealth but it's also very often the case.

While it's ridiculous to view wealth as a finite thing, it's just as ridiculous to imply hysteria over wealth inequality is based in ignorance. There is a long-standing trend of capitalists treating lower classes as exploitable resources undeserving of the means to have a healthy and happy existence beyond what keeps them productive inside the constraints of the current system.

Median salaries haven't been stagnant while the rich get richer because that's what's best for everyone, it's because that's what's best for the people with control.

Re: The world needs more search engines

#144

Post by simplicio »

bbulkow wrote: post #92

A competitive market with high barrier to entry seems to stabilize at 3 entrants. Others that might seem to be in market are niche players. Scale is good for consumers, benefit of scale is a thing, so 'trust busting' should happen if there are fewer than three. In the us search market, we have google, ddg, and Bing. Wanting more choice is very American, but it's hard to take seriously.

I don't think search really has a high barrier to entry. Certainly not compared to things I usually associate the term with like, say, airplane manufacture or deep sea oil extraction. Duck Duck Go only had three employees when they passed a million visitors, so I can't imagine they required huge amounts of capital.

Re: The world needs more search engines

#145

Post by hu3 »

tpllaha wrote: post #135
weinzierl wrote: post #82

I looked into the Cliqz browser a few years a ago. Back then they claimed to be a privacy respecting alternative to Chrome. What I found back then is that they sent every keystroke I type in the URL bar to their own servers. They outright lied about that in their terms. For me their mission is pretty clear: Google ate Burda's ad cookies and now they are trying to get their hands into the cookie jar again. Given that…

They have an autosuggest feature in the browser which shows search results as you type. Goes without saying that this requires a request per keystroke. If each request contained a unique user id, that would be concerning, but that is not the case. that the search query itself goes to their servers is just common sense, but those requests are anonymized. (Disclaimer: I'm a former employee)

Keystrokes + IP = NSA knows exactly what I'm typing.

This "feature" should be off by default on any software that claims to be a privacy respecting alternative to Chrome.

Re: The world needs more search engines

#146

Post by rbinv »

dewey wrote: post #140

Was looking at that Cliqz company out of curiosity and while browsing their job page ( https://cliqz.com/en/about/careers/campaign-manager ) saw this: "MyOffrz is opening a brand new marketing discipline: Browser Based Performance Marketing. This innovative technology makes it possible to show users discounts, special offers and valuable information with true added value within the browser. As a 100% subsidiary of Cl…

> Seems a bit odd for a company that brands itself as a privacy search engine.

Cliqz is nothing but a parasite disguised as a pro-privacy product, funded by Hubert Burda Media (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubert_Burda_Media).

Their strategy to move into the couponing/voucher market comes as no surprise, since injecting ads (which this basically is) is a very lucrative business - and they have the customer base to do so. The line between malware and "legitimate" browser (extension) becomes increasingly blurred.

Re: The world needs more search engines

#147

Post by Mikeb85 »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #109
bko wrote: post #73

Google's dominance is almost entirely due to the fact that its by far the best at search. I use ddg, but I use google search via !g about 25-50% of the time after a failed attempts. And 9 times out of 10 Google gives me exactly what I'm looking for. For instance: "the actor that plays the news guy in spiderman" ddg: Tom Holland (side bar) Spider-Man Homecoming (imdb) Tom Holland (wiki) Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Ver…

> And the results were made in incognito mode so Google wasn't able to cheat with privileged information about me as a user. that's not what Incognito mode does. It prevents your search from being included in the browsing history and doesn't send cookies from active sessions, but that's about it. Google still knows this is you being unauthenticated. You don't need to be logged into google to be reliably targeted with…

Do you have any evidence of what you claim?

Anyhow, based on what I've seen, when you go into incognito mode it definitely doesn't use your profile when you go to Google services. Search results, suggestions, etc... are different. In fact, one of the use cases for incognito is using a different Google profile on a someone else's or a public computer. Keeping contextual search results from the 'main' profile logged into the browser would be counterproductive...

Re: The world needs more search engines

#148

Post by Terretta »

jefftk wrote: post #120
DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the results were made in incognito mode so Google wasn't able to cheat with privileged information about me as a user. that's not what Incognito mode does. It prevents your search from being included in the browsing history and doesn't send cookies from active sessions, but that's about it. Google still knows this is you being unauthenticated. You don't need to be logged into google to be reliably targeted with…

Why do you think Google Search still knows who you are when you search in Incognito mode? (Or, in Firefox, if you open a private browsing window.) How would it know? There are advertising companies that use fingerprinting for ad targeting, but Google doesn't. (Disclosure: I work at Google on ads, speaking only for myself)

How does it know to offer (in incognito mode) a list of your accounts you might want to re-login to? (Not always, but often enough to raise an eyebrow.)

Seems like a pretty good reason to think it still knows who you are.

As to how that works, you tell us.

Re: The world needs more search engines

#149

Post by thsowers »

paul7986 wrote: post #142
keepper wrote: post #71

It’s really sad to see the anti-success rhetoric. I was around during the “search wars”, and what’s usually forgotten is that well, they were by far the best behaved as a corporate entity. This “romantization” of this ideal state, devoid of historical context or acknowledgement of the world we live in is extremwly counter productive. Should google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple do better? Absofuckinglutely!!! Regulate them…

As Google has gotten bigger it seems to forgotten its motto of "Do No Evil," and done the total opposite for the sake of profits! It was an inspirational company and story that many rooted for due to its culture and mission.

IIRC, they actually removed the "Don't be Evil" motto in may of 2018
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