Google competitor DuckDuckGo says it's getting shut out

But I feel compelled to respond. If there is no alternative to Google for something as important as indexing the output of human knowledge production... we are in serious trouble. The library of Alexandria burned and we still have no idea why [0].

Google is interested in one thing, getting you to look at ads. In their defense, well-targeted ads (++efficiency!). However when given the opportunity they have exploited their leadership position for every commercial advantage and recently to the detriment of search (e.g., I do not care to see what a bunch of "thought leaders" in google+ have to say on the topic I'm searching for). Their support for "Do Not Track" is grudging at best. [1]

Their business model is approaching that of a virus infecting a host. They enter an external market and utilize their near monopoly in web search/advertising to drive the value proposition for competitors to near-zero. And that gives me pause. It is like Starbucks opening in every local branch of your public library.

So, I support DDG and I give them feedback on my own time in the hopes they aren't also inherently out to screw me in the end. Also because I do believe (and this is an assumption on my part) that a "cosmic" -- well that may be an overreach -- law is involved. Search is not a natural monopoly [2].

[0] http://www.economicshelp.org/dictionary/n/natural-monopoly.h... [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Google#Do_Not_Trac... [2] http://www.economicshelp.org/dictionary/n/natural-monopoly.h...

First, I agree that they should not lump themselves in the same category. Second, I am not sure there is any point in crying yourself hoarse about how "different" you are when the general public who are looking for you using natural language constructs are not being allowed to access you in the first place by the "market leader". Going forward this that line of thought, I am reproducing my reply from below to your point, as it seems relevant here as well. (Apologies for the multiple posting).

If you read @yegge's original response from below (I reproduced it here)

This only started happening after I asked about the domain name. It used to point to a history page about Duck Corporation (previous name of On2 -- http://web.archive.org/web/20100802014055/http://duck.com/), similar to http://www.on2.com/, which was acquired by Google in the same acquisition.

Google should legitimately not sell it to me, though it would have been of course nice to do so when I first asked in 2010. I think an appropriate remedy would be to either point it nowhere, point it to the original page it had been pointed to for many years, or point it to the acquisition page (as http://on2.com still does) -- all things they do in other cases if you look at past acquisitions.

Effectively it is Google's fault because they are doing it now specifically in his case and not for others (as he mentions clearly) (because from their own tracking of searches, they probably found out that DDG is gaining significant traction -- this is my own opinion)

Secondly, while it would be nice to pre-empt all angles and all possibilities etc., etc., but I don't think any of us can foresee every possible way something will come back to bite your backside in the future. So, no, I don't think that it is somehow DDG's fault that they did not foresee this and preempt it.

P.S: FWIW, google renamed themselves from googol to google because the VC mispelled their name on the cheque. Just goes to show that such things are a fact of life. People have every right to vaguely try to look up "Duck something" search engine. However, Google is definitely in the wrong for sneakily redirecting users back to their own engine in this case by misusing this vagueness.

This only started happening after I asked about the domain name. It used to point to a history page about Duck Corporation (previous name of On2 -- http://web.archive.org/web/20100802014055/http://duck.com/), similar to http://www.on2.com/, which was acquired by Google in the same acquisition.

Google should legitimately not sell it to me, though it would have been of course nice to do so when I first asked in 2010. I think an appropriate remedy would be to either point it nowhere, point it to the original page it had been pointed to for many years, or point it to the acquisition page (as http://on2.com still does) -- all things they do in other cases if you look at past acquisitions.

Effectively it is Google's fault because they are doing it now specifically in his case and not for others (as he mentions clearly)

Secondly, while it would be nice to pre-empt all angles and all possibilities etc., etc., but I don't think any of us can foresee every possible way something will come back to bite your backside in the future. So, no, I don't think that it is somehow DDG's fault that they did not foresee this and preempt it.

P.S: FWIW, google renamed themselves from googol to google because the VC mispelled their name on the cheque. Just goes to show that such things are a fact of life. People have every right to vaguely try to look up "Duck something" search engine. However, Google is definitely in the wrong for sneakily redirecting users back to their own engine in this case by misusing this vagueness.