Until I can give it an 'improper' try from a web page (rather than installing an extension), no.
Funny to say "it's built for devs" then go on to say that an extension is required because normal users...
Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
271–280 of 477 posts
Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#272Earlier quoted context omitted.
Best growth hack: add a link to Google below your first results page. That way, more people will use your engine as their first choice, because they can easily fall back on their previously preferred search engine.
Great idea! We have it below the 2nd app on every page right now :)
I can't emphasize the parent's comment enough. Being able to look through a set of results and then quickly get Google results if I don't find what I'm looking for are key to getting me to try any other search engine (For historical reference, this is how Excel killed Lotus 123 a few decades ago - by making it super easy to do Lotus exports from Excel so that people who tried Excel didn't feel like they were "trapped" into being outside of the Lotus 123 ecosystem at the time).
I saw the Google link you mentioned, but (at least on mobile) it didn't stand out. I would at least try doing a test where you put something super prominent up at the top of results: "Didn't find what you're looking for? Try your search on Google instead."
Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#273Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hey 1 It's me, Richard Socher and my cofounder Bryan MacCann. Stanford, MetaMind startup, then Salesforce. Plus a bunch of other incredible and wonderful humans :) 2 We raised a 20m seed from Marc Benioff, Jim Breyer and a few others. 3 the you.com has never been for sales. 4 yea. we haven't really thought about it too much but have some creative ideas we want to explore together with our community. in private mode,…
5 is the most important because without a reasonable revenue model, selling to a larger company and washing your hands of your privacy promises is the clearest way to make money later. Edit: you guys didn’t buy you.com from anybody? The domain “you.com” was up for grabs and you guys bought it for $10 on godaddy? Edit 2: Thanks for answering 3a in the affirmative :). Yes, this is funded by folks that have made million…
He got it from Marc Benioff, who purchased in 1996. I'm assuming as a favor or private transaction, given that Richard and Marc know each other (from Salesforce) and the seed round.
Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#274I searched for 'Pouchdb full text search', saw the horizontal scrolling cards then immediately switched back to Startpage.com. I can't see how sorting through info with horizontal scroll could ever be an improvement. It's bad enough on desktop, but most searches happen in mobile where it's even more annoying.
Don't ever try Instagram. You'll hate it :)
You're getting lots of good feedback and these are your types of responses. I don't understand it.
Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#275Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hey 1 It's me, Richard Socher and my cofounder Bryan MacCann. Stanford, MetaMind startup, then Salesforce. Plus a bunch of other incredible and wonderful humans :) 2 We raised a 20m seed from Marc Benioff, Jim Breyer and a few others. 3 the you.com has never been for sales. 4 yea. we haven't really thought about it too much but have some creative ideas we want to explore together with our community. in private mode,…
5 is the most important because without a reasonable revenue model, selling to a larger company and washing your hands of your privacy promises is the clearest way to make money later. Edit: you guys didn’t buy you.com from anybody? The domain “you.com” was up for grabs and you guys bought it for $10 on godaddy? Edit 2: Thanks for answering 3a in the affirmative :). Yes, this is funded by folks that have made million…
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Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#276Earlier quoted context omitted.
DuckDuckGo seens to have been able to do this just fine, even with the weirdest name for a company ever. Their growing by word of mouth from geeks like us. I set DDG as default on all of my family/friends browsers. Focus on making a good search and users will come
Their growing by word of mouth from geeks like us Well, to be complete, DDG also advertises on radio, on streaming, on billboards, and in newspapers. I think TV is the only place I haven't seen a DDG ad.
It does now. Were they busting out the billboards when they first launched?
Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#277Installing an extension. ha ha lol. good luck.
Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#278Earlier quoted context omitted.
Having the extension and letting people try it on the web seems like a more reasonable choice. People need to try it out. That said...there is a search textbox at the top of the page and it worked for me in Firefox and Chrome. Did people just miss it? If so, it should probably be in the middle with the big blue button.
it takes 5 seconds to install and uninstall an extension. we will open source it also so people can see how simple and benign it is. It feels like 5s to help move the internet away from a privacy invading monopoly isn't too bad? If you like privacy and agency of your information diet, or saving lots of time while coding, or Reddit results always accessible to browse for most queries, etc. Then the 5s install will be…
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Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#279For web search, are you using the Bing API? If so, do you have thoughts from the private beta on how it compares to Google - where it does similarly/better, where it does worse?
Great question: We are first ranking apps and then within apps we have some of our own ranking but e.g. web results come from Bing. We have found that when non-web-result-apps trigger in the top 2, we are often as good or better than Google. Web results by themselves are a mixed bag, which is why we built out lots of custom apps for developers, e.g. StackOverflow (with code snippets), W3Schools, MDN, Copilot-like Cod…
Whenever the subject of personalising search results comes up in technical communities, the most common thing I hear are people saying they wish they could remove W3Schools from their search results automatically. Specifically that particular site. It’s got a terrible reputation. People have even built browser extensions to do it:
https://www.google.com/search?q=remove+w3schools+from+search...
In that context, it seems strange you consider this a selling point when so many people regard the inclusion of this site in their search results to be a failure. Perhaps pick a different site to keep mentioning? It doesn’t give the best impression when you proudly say “Hey, you know that site you hate? We give it special priority!”
Is it possible to remove this site from your results entirely?
Also, it’s not clear what “JSON checkers” means in the context of a search engine.
Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs
#280Install an extension? ha ha lol. good luck.