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DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

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Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#71

Post by Morg »

nextparadigms wrote: post #41
sounds wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see DDG taking Google's search crown. But it could happen the way Firefox opened the barn door - then other browsers came to take the crown (Chrome, for example). [1] indicates DDG uses third-party APIs for deep web searches. To me that sounds like how Inktomi was a "search engine API" and neither Inktomi nor Yahoo saw Google coming [2]. Even if DDG doesn't succeed, Google is now at the top of the hill and th…

Last time I tried both, I liked Blekko a lot more than DDG. So unless the "don't let ads track me" becomes a huge issue - like 100x bigger than it is now - I doubt people will be switching from Google to DDG.

I recently almost completely stopped using youtube. Then I downloaded adblock video plugin - was using firefox at that time.

Ads can be a major pain, and any business that requires them is probably going to fail, intolerance to ads is building up as ads are more and more agressive.

Switching to DDG because of ads wouldn't make much sense, they'll get their own ads when they have to pay for servers, too.

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#72

Post by glesica »

tferris wrote: post #60
jaems33 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google has four colours in their name. The length of the url isn't that big of a deal to me. I just type 'du' and the first url autosuggested is duckduckgo.

> Google has four colours in their name. Yes, but just in their logo, that's ok because the rest of Google stands behind the expressive logo, is clear, has lots of white space, decent colors etc. Now go to DDG: read header, blue search button on result page and green search button on landing, what the heck?? Strange colors in the text results and this ugly duck, sorry but getting a really nice duck on freelancer.com…

Google's search button is grey on the landing page and blue on the results page. Does anyone actually click the search button? Heck, does anyone actually even go to the landing page? I don't think I've ever actually used DDG's landing page, I just use the Chrome address bar...

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#73

Post by glesica »

tedunangst wrote: post #46
dwc wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sheesh. This was true of Google in the late 1990s when I was telling my coworkers to use it. If everyone listened to people like you then we'd be using Yahoo! and Altavista today.

The difference is that Google was actually better.

DDG is better for some people. I use it and haven't missed Google yet. There are some things I need Google for (!m gives me a map for example) and some things I prefer Google for (I use G+), but for general search DDG is a better experience for me.

Really, why did anyone ever switch from Yahoo? It wasn't for the results, Google provided the search results for Yahoo for awhile. Many people, myself included, switched to Google for the clean interface.

Now I've switched to DDG not just for the results (which are 95% "just as good") but for the privacy, the variety (I like the idea of competing services), and some of the interesting things DDG is doing with providing information directly.

As I've said before, search is an intensely personal tool. Don't use a tool if you don't like it, but recognize that other people might like a tool even if you think it's terrible.

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#74

Post by huhtenberg »

nostromo wrote: post #45

The comments on HN in the past few weeks have been so mean spirited. What happened? I chalked Facebook up to schadenfreude -- but DDG?

Just look at the contents of the front page. It's no longer Hacker News, it's mainstream Tech News with a bit of nerdy sprinkle. The older audience is heavily diluted with those who push pseudo-tech cruft (like a woman suing a VC) to the front page, the same people who also comment more and don't really get the spirit of the board. HN is at its tipping point. I am eagerly waiting for HN2... that's assuming one hasn't been started already and kept private.

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#75

Post by barik »

I've become a loyal fan of DuckDuckGo. In November of 2011, just for the heck of it, I decided to e-mail support@duckduckgo.com about an issue (the difficulty of performing academic searches). I was extremely impressed when I received a response from Gabriel Weinberg himself. I have been using DuckDuckGo exclusively ever since.

At first, I had a lot of reservations about switching and found myself using g! quite often. Then I realized that I wasn't necessary more impressed with Google results, I was just __used__ to it. For instance, I hated DDG's zero-click info sources, because I would mentally ignore it. It seemed like a waste of space. Now it's the first thing I look at when the search results show up -- and it's generally what I want.

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#76

Post by impldefined »

Cyranix wrote: post #54

I'm quite surprised at the amount of vitriol for DDG in the comments here. I switched many months ago -- probably nearing a year now -- and haven't looked back. I definitely appreciate the effort that has been put into privacy and simplicity. The zero-click box has come in handy at times (though I often find myself clicking through the box anyway, in which case it's a glorified top result, and that's okay with me). M…

You're being overly sensitive. He didn't say something bad about your mother, he pointed out what was wrong with a thing, a product and IMO he was mostly right.

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#77

Post by nico_h »

tferris wrote: post #43

What I like about DDG: - Somebody is trying to improve the search engine space which is too long dominated by just one party (which admittedly makes a damn good job) What I don't like: - I don't see any improvements - Don't like their name - Crappy logo - Too long domain name (with some skills and little money, a great 4-letter dot com is a no brainer) - The product is awkward to use: the entire UI is the #1 reason t…

I love the name and the logo. The search result page is uncluttered & pretty enough.

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#78

Post by lubujackson »

codeka wrote: post #40
suking wrote: post #11

I'm so sick of these DDG stories. The truth is no one uses them, 99.9999% of people outside SV have never heard of them and currently there is no reason to switch to them.

The thing I don't understand is, for all that DDG does, there's really nothing that Google and/or Bing couldn't just copy wholesale if it were really that great. The ONLY thing DuckDuckGo can do that Google won't is "privacy" (maybe "less ads" is another thing). While that might be reason enough for some people to switch, it's barely going to make a dent in Google's dominance.

Reading all these comments made me wonder... If DDG uses the Bing API and is passing the search term to whatever search-related text ads they show, that's a pretty big blind spot for the privacy advocates. Because Bing still gets your search term and so does the ad network. What they don't get is your IP address, but as the AOL search dump proved, sometimes search terms alone are enough to identify someone. It's still a nice feature, but I wouldn't consider it a solved issue.

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#79

Post by AznHisoka »

zecho wrote: post #61
sounds wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see DDG taking Google's search crown. But it could happen the way Firefox opened the barn door - then other browsers came to take the crown (Chrome, for example). [1] indicates DDG uses third-party APIs for deep web searches. To me that sounds like how Inktomi was a "search engine API" and neither Inktomi nor Yahoo saw Google coming [2]. Even if DDG doesn't succeed, Google is now at the top of the hill and th…

I don't think DDG needs to take anybody's crown to be successful. It provides a service to a few niches, mainly the tinfoil hat types and to people who mostly use Google as an intermediary to find wikipedia articles or posts on stack overflow and want a low-friction alternative. Or there's me: I mainly prefer the keyboard shortcuts. Anyway, my point is that 1% of the search market is about half a billion dollars in r…

No.. That's a common misconception. 1% of search market is not 1% of revenue because companies won't spend any time and investment in places with little traffic.

Bing is 20% of search market yet last I checked they are nowhere near that amount in revenue

Re: DuckDuckGo Cooks Google's Goose

#80

Post by [deleted] »

huhtenberg wrote: post #74
nostromo wrote: post #45

The comments on HN in the past few weeks have been so mean spirited. What happened? I chalked Facebook up to schadenfreude -- but DDG?

Just look at the contents of the front page. It's no longer Hacker News, it's mainstream Tech News with a bit of nerdy sprinkle. The older audience is heavily diluted with those who push pseudo-tech cruft (like a woman suing a VC) to the front page, the same people who also comment more and don't really get the spirit of the board. HN is at its tipping point. I am eagerly waiting for HN2... that's assuming one hasn't…

[deleted]
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