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I Lost Faith in Kagi

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Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#461

Post by pessimizer »

carlosjobim wrote: post #365
recursivegirth wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work in CX, you should listen to your customers. Your gut got you this far, but to be a profitable company you are going to need to consider the advice and concerns of your stakeholders. Based on your current description, you have two stakeholders (yourself + customers). If the venture fails, you will ask yourself if you listened enough. Be proactive, address concerns, do not put yourself in a defensive position. E…

>I work in CX, you should listen to your customers. The only way a customer speaks is with money. If people like what you sell, you'll have more customers speaking with their wallet. If they don't then they tell you so by not purchasing what you sell. Internet commenters (such as myself) do not represent all customers or even a majority. People who are happy with a product usually see no reason to give feedback – esp…

This sounds like a great argument for not listening to anyone, or improving your product or messaging at all. Make the obvious observation that the complainers are a minority (ignoring that vocal non-complainers are also a minority), that their public complaints don't represent the opinions of one or two orders of magnitude of people who won't ever complain (just silently drop), are not ever influential, and that the silent majority support every decision you've made.

The cool part is that as people start leaving your product, complainers will become an even smaller minority, so you'll never have to second guess yourself. Maybe blame it on bullying?

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#462

Post by riku_iki »

elektor wrote: post #392
brewdad wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somewhere between 20,000 (number of t-shirts sent out) and 50,000 (their stated next target). Not too bad for a startup but a drop in the proverbial ocean of search.

They have a live tracker of subscribers, 25,785 at time of posting comment. https://kagi.com/stats

how one can run search engine on 2-3M annual budget(with assumption avg subscription is $10/m)?..

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#463

Post by prmoustache »

freediver wrote: post #288
RhysU wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Kagi does no paid advertising Because of adverse selection? Users that are users because of marketing are somehow different?

I meant digital advertising, like ads in search engines and websites - stuff that has gone out of control and we are actively fighting against. I would consider a billboard or sponsoring a podcast for example.

Billboards are ethically and morally disgusting.

It is trying at all cost to make drivers lose focus of the road to see your advert, putting themselves and the people around them at risk of a road crash.

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#464

Post by UberFly »

ACow_Adonis wrote: post #113
nebulous1 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can make that argument for initial approach, but it falls flat on its face after the author told Vlad that they didn't want to communicate with them and Vlad responded with a lecture. Vlad comes off as fairly unhinged here.

Perhaps we live in different worlds, but there's a world of distanced between unhinged and roughly 3 emails to someone who wrote a peice targeted specifically at your business. If anything the replies in that Mastadon thread make the author and others appear petty, combative and immature imo, and I do not say that as someone who agrees with all Vlad's perspectives.

It all had the usual flame-bait "look at me" vibe as much as any substance. I feel that Vlad fell for the bait more than anything.

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#465

Post by a_vanderbilt »

elektor wrote: post #392
brewdad wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somewhere between 20,000 (number of t-shirts sent out) and 50,000 (their stated next target). Not too bad for a startup but a drop in the proverbial ocean of search.

They have a live tracker of subscribers, 25,785 at time of posting comment. https://kagi.com/stats

Honestly I'm astonished there are only that many.

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#466

Post by andriamanitra »

I've been using Kagi as my primary search engine for over 2 years. The search is much more customizable than anything else out there, and the results are usually slightly better than Google's. I don't find their current AI offerings useful but I don't mind the experimentation because I do think there is potential for big improvements to be discovered there. I just turn the AI features off until they figure out something that really works.

I share the concerns about wasting time and money on the other silly side projects (t-shirts, email, maps..), but as long as they don't negatively affect the search product or sink the entire company I don't truly care.

I do not like that their promise of privacy relies entirely on aligned incentives and trust, but it is no worse than the alternatives that all rely on ad-tech money.

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#467

Post by manuelmoreale »

sph wrote: post #193
t8sr wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the risk of sounding grumpy, a big difference between the tech community today and in the Usenet days is that the Usenet crowd's interpersonal skills weren't two standard deviations to the left of the mean at your local Target.

We reminisce about Usenet as this cesspool of human interaction, while everybody today is a pre-offended sociopath with an audience. I miss talking with the average idiot from the 2000s internet.

Not a Usenet user, still an average idiot with an open inbox and a love for talking with random people. If you miss those days ping me via email, I’m always happy to meet new people.

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#468

Post by shufflerofrocks »

"No one wants full anonymity unless they are criminals, and we don't want customers as criminals" is a yikes.

I don't mind the financial misplay(?), the possibly unsustainable diversification, the lil bit of corporate hypocrisy, or the AI - they're endeavours that can't be avoided while trying to make a compaany profitable - as long as they do what they can do best, WHILE maintaining the stance & spirit taken for forming the company.

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#469

Post by FireBeyond »

sumeno wrote: post #143
ACow_Adonis wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps we live in different worlds, but there's a world of distanced between unhinged and roughly 3 emails to someone who wrote a peice targeted specifically at your business. If anything the replies in that Mastadon thread make the author and others appear petty, combative and immature imo, and I do not say that as someone who agrees with all Vlad's perspectives.

If someone tells you to stop emailing them after 1 email don't send 2 more. It's that easy

Sure. But the first time they said "don't email me any more", it was actually more like "Don't email me any more... and another thing! X Y Z." playing an equally petty game of "who gets the last word".

Re: I Lost Faith in Kagi

#470

Post by _cenw »

After exchanging about 15 emails with Vlad, I can confirm "appear measured and willing to change opinion, but zero budge". It was frustrating to be told I provide "high quality" discussion while many points remained unaddressed or just evaded into boring "we can't know intentions of search users" as if he was building a government.

For instance, he claimed both that a search engine shouldn't judge someone for searching how to commit suicide, because they might just want the equivalent of legal euthanasia in a place where it's unavailable and a global search engine should be value neutral for it can't possibly know all cultural norms, but also said "it wouldn't work" as a backup argument that was promptly ignored when I provided a study contrary to it.

I ended up feeling like Vlad has a lot of implicit beliefs that are rooted in free speech absolutism, but will rationalize via other unfalsifiable arguments (like scope creep / too many unknowns) while appearing like he'd be open to be convinced. I still use Kagi, but I'm ready to jump ship at the first opportunity.

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