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What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

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Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

#141

Post by s_dev »

TheRealDunkirk wrote: post #87
JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #2

DuckDuckGo is really changing my world. It’s like I’m seeing a whole other internet I was missing before with Google search results. I get much more relevant answers and less SEO targeted garbage that says all the right words usually while saying nothing at all. I was skeptical, but I encourage you to give it a try if you haven’t before.

I'm consistently surprised that this comment comes up here so often. I've tried DDG at length, many times, and I always go back to Google because I find it SO much better for programming-related questions. Maybe the denizens of HN are accustomed to using SO's built-in search? But that's still only a piece of the larger puzzle. I get a lot of mileage from blog posts as well.

You're not missing anything. Google is far better than DDG and I'm shocked people claim otherwise because it's so fairly self evident.

That said I try to use DDG when I can but I don't lie to myself that I'm using it because it has better results -- it doesn't. It has better approach to privacy and thats why I use it. The fact that they know less about the searcher intrinsitcally means the results of searches will be worse.

Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

#143

Post by djsumdog »

monsieurgaufre wrote: post #119
JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #2

DuckDuckGo is really changing my world. It’s like I’m seeing a whole other internet I was missing before with Google search results. I get much more relevant answers and less SEO targeted garbage that says all the right words usually while saying nothing at all. I was skeptical, but I encourage you to give it a try if you haven’t before.

DDG is bad as soon as you're not in the US of A and/or speak any language that is not english.

What about Russian? I'm not sure if they still do, but at one point they licensed a large chunk of their index from Yandex.

Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

#144

Post by muks »

I wish well-done XMPP/Jabber clients that do voice come up. If you are an XMPP protocol developer / implementer reading this, thank you for what is there so far. Please don't stop.

If you have been watching the news this week about Jeff Bezos.. I don't like that someone can share a message/picture/video on WhatsApp and crack into a phone. There are too many closed source vendor components in an Android phone even if you're using an open source phone OS like Lineage OS, and these may go stale over time or have something vulnerable in them on purpose.

WhatsApp always seems to need a phone. It works in a web browser in an inconvenient manner that still needs the phone to login. It is a centrally controlled system. While Signal is open source, it is also centrally controlled. I prefer and hope Jabber implementations get much better. Spam for Jabber can be managed the way it is managed for email. Some spam would get through, but it does on WhatsApp too.

Email hasn't gone away or lost its place because it's federated (distributed). It works on multiple platforms, and if you don't like a particular way of doing email, there are a lot of choices. Jabber is similar for instant messaging, but it can do with a renaissance. (I use Jabber at work and home, but the clients I use such as Conversations don't have the features and experience that WhatsApp/Telegram do.)

The oldest and most used services are federated - HTTP, email.. and at the start of a communication - DNS.

WhatsApp, Facebook, etc. are very entrenched services. It's not enough that you move from WhatsApp - your family, friends, businesses that you work with, all have to use the new service you are switching to, so you can chat with them on that other service.

It's easier to switch your search engine. :) DuckDuckGo has worked very well for web search for me. I use it about 95% of the time and Google Search the other 5%.

Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

#145

Post by senthil_rajasek »

fenwick67 wrote: post #93
senthil_rajasek wrote: post #4

Why are Google and Facebook in the same jail? What breach of privacy is Google guilty of?

> What breach of privacy is Google guilty of Some people would consider tracking users across the entire web and selling ads based on their behavior to be disrespectful of privacy. Google hasn't had any big fuck-ups like Facebook with CA, but ultimately they both are advertising companies that owe their success to selling personalized ads.

They are very different ad companies.

One shows ads along side search results based on what you are looking for... FB snoops on me and shoves cereal ads at me like street corner flyer pushers.

Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

#148

Post by rikkus »

chx wrote: post #76
JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #2

DuckDuckGo is really changing my world. It’s like I’m seeing a whole other internet I was missing before with Google search results. I get much more relevant answers and less SEO targeted garbage that says all the right words usually while saying nothing at all. I was skeptical, but I encourage you to give it a try if you haven’t before.

So I need a 1m long C7-C8 extension cord. Not a 30cm, not a 50cm, not a 1.8m, I need 1m long. Let's search: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=c7+c8+extension+cord+%221m%22&t=h_... let's force the titles: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=intitle%3Ac7+intitle%3Ac8+extensio... That's completely broken, the titles contain none of the three things asked for. yeah, I am not hopeful with duckduckgo either. I mean, Google is just as bad bu…

First result for me on DDG is that very thing on Amazon.co.uk

Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

#149

Post by thiagoharry »

haolez wrote: post #108
conception wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capitalism isn't all about choice and competition. Free Markets are. Capitalism is about the means of production being held in private hands - but those private hands still do their best to own all of the means of production and to lock out potential competitors. The two get conflated (free markets and capitalism) but they are different beasts. In fact, you can have a free market socialism (tried semi-successfully by…

Free market socialism? How would information about value be propagated? That's usually done via prices and money.

Some options:

a) Also using competition, prices and money, but with factories, companies and lands organized by worker's cooperatives, with the profit shared according with some logic not based in mere property.

b) Using only prices and money while keeping updated data about production and consumption, and updating prices based in these data. Perhaps easier with modern technology than in the past. The information about these things can propagate in wires and communication means like the other kind of information that the society needs.

Re: What can you use instead of Google and Facebook?

#150

Post by rikkus »

anderspitman wrote: post #8

Google is relatively straight forward to replace. Inexpensive 80% solutions exist for most of their services. Maps is a notable exception. As for Facebook you're fighting against the greatest network effects in the history of mankind.

Apple Maps has replaced Google Maps for me. I’ve been trying to move away from Google and this has been an easy one. I don’t notice the difference most of the time. When I do, it’s because I’ve pulled up Google Maps by accident and it’s cluttered and spammy.
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