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The next Google

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Re: The next Google

#461

Post by unethical_ban »

ipaddr wrote: post #400
unethical_ban wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DuckDuckGo is horrendous for spam and malware distribution. I have stopped recommending it to non-technical people because they can't recognize the obviously evil/bad-pattern sites that are on the first page of many DDG searches I do

What are you searching for?

User manuals for stereo systems, specs for old hardware. Anything that can be generically referenced, maybe a bit harder to find. Someone can throw up a webpage that SEO's on "manual" or "user guide" and when I type in "Sony DTH-345 user guide" I'll see results like "manualsonline.xyz" that are clearly bogus.

I can't lab it up now, but that is the gist. And DDG has it while Google rarely has the same level of it.

Re: The next Google

#462

Post by prawn »

chaostheory wrote: post #344
boomer918 wrote: post #12

These solutions don't answer any of the fundamental problems with Google: - who pays for the service (ads? users pay? Average user will never use a paid service if a free one is available) - how to resist attacks against the algorithm (Google has been fighting spam for decades) - how to personalize without invading privacy, e.g. Google had an option to search through your email in Google search...it's gone now, I won…

Adding on to this, customization is nice but customization is not why DuckDuckGo isn't as good as Google. The reason nothing is as good as Google is because Google indexes way more content than every other service that I'm aware of

Is that the key though? There's a lot of stuff I'd be quite happy if they didn't index!

Re: The next Google

#463

Post by bmitc »

My primary want from a search engine is to not remove search terms I explicitly typed in and to point me to search results that don't have the end goal of wanting me to buy something, unless that's what searched for. It boggles my mind that search engines today assume I didn't actually mean the search terms I typed in.

Re: The next Google

#464

Post by prawn »

_jal wrote: post #20
boomer918 wrote: post #12

These solutions don't answer any of the fundamental problems with Google: - who pays for the service (ads? users pay? Average user will never use a paid service if a free one is available) - how to resist attacks against the algorithm (Google has been fighting spam for decades) - how to personalize without invading privacy, e.g. Google had an option to search through your email in Google search...it's gone now, I won…

Also important for anyone actually thinking of taking Google on, very few of the features listed are things Google can't easily do, too. Attacking their strengths is crazy. You better have something both crazy good and hard to replicate by someone with more money than god. Whatever replaces Google will be doing something that Google can't without causing them other problems. The first thing that comes to mind is make…

I've long wondered about a search engine that doesn't index a page that has AdSense or similar code. There'd be a lot of collateral damage, but it would knock out a lot of annoying made-for-adsense sites at least. Basic thinking, but along the lines of what you suggested.

Re: The next Google

#465

Post by amrocha »

amelius wrote: post #308
legohead wrote: post #98

I just went on a mini vacation to Vegas, and was thinking how nice it would be to just call up someone and ask for some simple advice. I did a bunch of online research before I booked things, but man was it painful. There are so many copy-cat blogs who just throw together a bunch of basic information with no real research done in order to get those clicks/adwords. For example: best hotel pool in vegas. Seems simple e…

The future is trust networks. Where you trust a number of friends, who trust other people, etc. and you can use a matrix of trust to retrieve review scores, etc. Imagine trusting HN, visiting Amazon and getting all the reviews from other HN users ...

"Trust networks" are literally the past, that's literally how humanity has worked ever since its inception

Re: The next Google

#466

Post by koonsolo »

I have a solution for the google problem, but don't have time to pursue this myself. So anyone interested, steal my idea! (Or bash it in the replies, it's HN after all :D)

Instead of pagerank we need peoplerank. Let's say we build a new elgooG search engine that you can customize by indicating which people you trust. For example I say to trust Paul Graham about the topics entrepreneur and startup. Then, authors like Paul can register a key on elgooG and sign their online articles with that key.

When I search topics related to startups, elgooG knows I trust Paul and will try to find articles from him or anyone that he trusts, or even 3rd grade connections.

It is very difficult to fool such a search engine with SEO optimization, since the user actually indicates which people to trust.

I'm pretyy confident it would be a good solution, but I'm afraid it's very hard to start up.

If you steal my idea, please consider giving me a 1% stake (or less) in your company ;D.

Re: The next Google

#467

Post by friendzis »

mulmen wrote: post #324
baxtr wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. People don't realize that the early web was elitist. Now, the entire population is online. And, as you said, most people simply don't care about the stuff we care about. That's also why "Google's search results are soo bad." They're not. For the bulk of Google's visitors, they're good enough.

Indeed. We live in the eternal September. But to be honest the internet is still the internet. The web still exists. Any lamentation at the loss of the "old" internet is that you don't have more angry uncles spewing political rhetoric on your motorcycle forum. Do you want the unwashed masses in your specialist forums? I certainly don't. Seems to me things are working pretty well. I do worry about the next generation…

> Do you want the unwashed masses in your specialist forums?

Having the choice between "unwashed masses" and "curated to suit political agenda" I would firmly choose the former.

Before I get attacked on political agenda angle, please understand that it takes trained professional actively trying to remain objective to have impartial moderation. Many professional discussion moderators fail here and you just cannot expect neither unpaid volunteers (doing things out of passion which is not impartial in the first place) nor paid employees enforcing company policy (again very much partial) to remain objective.

The goal of moderation should be to allow for multiple angles of thought to emerge and not get drowned. Give me the tools to see those non-mainstream positions.

Re: The next Google

#468

Post by powerapple »

Barrin92 wrote: post #45

I think 'more customization' which is a theme with a lot of these alternatives is a fundamental dead end. I don't know where this persistent myth comes from that people love choice and tinkering, because they clearly don't. There's a huge cost associated with having to make choices, and one feature of successful modern apps is that they're frictionless. That's why TikTok is so successful. There's no login, no user ch…

I haven't used Google's search for a long time. The sticky ones for me now are gmail and YouTube. gmail because it is a lock-in, once you have the email address, I don't think you can ever change. Since I am a Chinese now I have to think about if Google stops serving me in the future, but I am deeply invested in my gmail account :( The other one is YouTube, where it can work without login.

Google's simple box is not attractive when others can provide the same quality in search results.

Re: The next Google

#469

Post by friendzis »

koonsolo wrote: post #466

I have a solution for the google problem, but don't have time to pursue this myself. So anyone interested, steal my idea! (Or bash it in the replies, it's HN after all :D) Instead of pagerank we need peoplerank. Let's say we build a new elgooG search engine that you can customize by indicating which people you trust. For example I say to trust Paul Graham about the topics entrepreneur and startup. Then, authors like…

This algorithm would have an extremely bad discoverability an would be extremely susceptible to platformization. How would you find Melcher writing about car engine maintenance on Bent Piston forum when you yourself rank KingsEgg on Vroom forums as the authority on engine maintenance?

Which article do rank higher: one by Melcher that is highly ranked by large number of "random" individuals or the one recommended by KingsEgg?

Re: The next Google

#470

Post by usrbinbash »

redmen wrote: post #340
baxtr wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. People don't realize that the early web was elitist. Now, the entire population is online. And, as you said, most people simply don't care about the stuff we care about. That's also why "Google's search results are soo bad." They're not. For the bulk of Google's visitors, they're good enough.

It's not true I don't think. Anyone I watch older than 50 years old is constantly frustrated by google, they just don't know what's good, what's not. I think they use it because it's the "norm" and that is the only reason. And as far as everyone else.. I have no idea to be quite honest. I have a fairly big handful of non-techie friends who think google sucks but is good enough so there is no real incentive to change.…

> Anyone I watch older than 50 years old is constantly frustrated by google, they just don't know what's good, what's not.

Yes, and now imagine these same people, most of whom never bothered with basic google search options (eg. excluding entire domains, mandatory keywords, ...) presented with a search engine with a plethora of knobs and levers to tune it to their liking.

How well will they work with that?

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