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De-Googling: My Progress

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Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#151

Post by q92z8oeif »

bsharitt wrote: post #149

I posted a similar post on my own blog yesterday( https://sharitt.com/2020/04/28/practicality-vs-purity.html ) Oddly one of the few things I actually kept is Google search itself after noticed that I basically add !g to every DDG search, and I've tried to firewall it off as much as I can.

Having used DDG for several years now as the default on all my devices, i can say that since December the results are completely useless. Not sure what happened.

I had never to use "!g" before. Now it is required for 1/3 of my regular searches, and "!ig" for 100% of the image "!i" searches.

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#152

Post by Jenz »

cyrialize wrote: post #139

I have mostly de-googled myself. For search I mainly rely on DuckDuckGo, but as many people have pointed out sometimes DuckDuckGo doesn't cut it. When that happens I either use Google or Startpage. I usually use Google when I want information about a business near me. I haven't tested this thoroughly but I think Google does a better job of getting and presenting phone numbers, accurate store hours, etc. For email I'm…

When DuckDuckGo doesn’t cut it, which IME is not often, then Google is always easily available with !g query

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#153

Post by q92z8oeif »

galkk wrote: post #55
Naac wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What bugs specifically have you encountered?

The amount of random crashes on the Youtube pages is crazy

ironically, if you add the "youtube enhancer" add-on/extension, which allows you to bypass ads, the crashes go away.

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#154

Post by pgug »

amelius wrote: post #126
brabel wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as I would like to agree, as a user who has DDG as the default search engine, this is not my experience... DDG consistently gives me useless results when I search for less popular languages results (searching Dart, or the search-friendly dartlang, gives me crap every time, while Google finds stuff easily... sure, Dart is by Google, that may be a factor, but if I remember correctly, results for Groovy and very…

Does anyone know of a Firefox plugin that automatically adds a "!g" upon a gesture on mobile? I'm asking because adding the "!g" takes about 6-7 screen touches so it's quite inefficient, and it basically keeps me from using DDG.

When I use a mobile I usually type G! instead of !g because of autocorrect, and it works just the same.

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#155

Post by dredmorbius »

asdff wrote: post #47
catchmilk wrote: post #37

I really tried giving DDG a chance but I always found myself having to go back to Google to find the right information. This would especially pertain to technical matters. The 'average-joe-browsing' (e.g. amazon, movies, songs etc.) worked fine, but when it came down to research papers or solving software problems, I was too often left disappointed. A couple of weeks back I switched to Qwant[1]. Privacy focused, tech…

DDG is nowhere close to google scholar, much less pubmed. If you don't want to use google scholar, web of science is good too.

There's also Microsoft Academic search: https://academic.microsoft.com/home (!msacademic)

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#156

Post by [deleted] »

niyaven wrote: post #137
dao- wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you checked what factors make your browser fingerprint unique?

If you're using firefox, you're already in a bucket of only 4.42% [0]. But even without that, just take your screen resolution, browser + os version, font list, your time zone, and you're almost already unique. [0] https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/

[deleted]

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#157

Post by lysp »

dao- wrote: post #97
crashbunny wrote: post #95

I've done a similar thing, qwant, protonmail, firefox (4 different profiles and scores of containers), privacy badger, ublock origin, decentral eyes, but I'm convinced it's not possible to stop tracking. My browser finger print is unique and it doesn't seem possible to change that. Also I have an android phone with google apps, facebook, twitter, scores of other apps tracking me. There's not much I can do about givin…

Have you checked what factors make your browser fingerprint unique?

It's basically a lost cause to avoid fingerprinting.

https://www.amiunique.org/

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#158

Post by dredmorbius »

prodave wrote: post #52

Do de-googlers consider Startpage to be acceptable? The results are from google but they claim that your privacy is protected.

Pretty questionable.

A listing of search alternatives, including Qwant (French-based, so EU/GDPR), SwissCows, SearX, and others, with good rationales:

https://restoreprivacy.com/private-search-engine/

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#159

Post by fred_is_fred »

andrepd wrote: post #133

Moving from Google cloud to Apple cloud, from Google messenger to Facebook messenger... What's the point honestly?

You have a valid point on Facebook which may in fact be worse, but Apple's business case is not to hoover up every single piece of information about your life and then sell it to advertisers. They are there to sell hardware and a bit of software. That different motivation leads to different outcomes when a VP asks "should we do this with info we have?"

Re: De-Googling: My Progress

#160

Post by blaser-waffle »

Jenz wrote: post #152
cyrialize wrote: post #139

I have mostly de-googled myself. For search I mainly rely on DuckDuckGo, but as many people have pointed out sometimes DuckDuckGo doesn't cut it. When that happens I either use Google or Startpage. I usually use Google when I want information about a business near me. I haven't tested this thoroughly but I think Google does a better job of getting and presenting phone numbers, accurate store hours, etc. For email I'm…

When DuckDuckGo doesn’t cut it, which IME is not often, then Google is always easily available with !g query

or Startpage with !sp. or Bing with !b.

Amazon is !a, etc. etc.

DDG has some neat functionality via bangs (aka !): https://duckduckgo.com/bang

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