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DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

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Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#171

Post by kenhwang »

qwerpy wrote: post #143
osigurdson wrote: post #28

I actually like AI mode in Google. My main reason is if I just have a quick question it seems a lot quicker than logging into ChatGPT/Claude as I can just type it in the address bar. Of course DDG / others can do the exact same thing as they already have an AI mode. Maybe you can even set up ChatGPT as a search engine - not sure. The key for this use case is speed - it has to be nearly instant.

I'm as anti-Google as anyone out there. I block all their ads, refuse to pay for youtube, go out of my way to avoid their hardware, etc. But I have to admit AI mode is great. It's fast, free, not yet cluttered with ads, and useful. I treat it as a search engine that does a fuzzy search rather than the more literal text match search that we're used to. I recently bought a Bambu 3d printer after Reddit/HN drew my atten…

I'm the same way, I hate using Google search for searching because it's basically useless, and their other ecosystem offerings generally get enshittified over time so it's not worth paying for or relying on.

But if they're letting me using AI for free without logging in and I just need a dumb AI slop answer, then I'm more than happy to burn their tokens instead of my own. Any serious work goes to a different LLM provider. The switching cost for moving to a different LLM provider in the future is practically zero.

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#172

Post by Legend2440 »

mrweasel wrote: post #82
Legend2440 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to Google, users are adopting it. They say AI mode is the most popular feature they've ever introduced, and is driving an increase in total search queries. >Just one year after its debut, AI Mode has surpassed one billion monthly users, with queries more than doubling every quarter since launch. As people have realized just how much more Search can do for them, they’re searching more than ever before — so m…

While I'm not opposed to the idea that Google AI mode is so good that people use it more, I also feel like the average person only have so many queries per day. Google statement would indicate that people had a number of queries that they just opted to ignore, because find the answers was to cumbersome. I'm not entirely sure I'm buying that, unless users keep prompting the AI to reduce the amount of reading they need…

AI mode isn't for queries, it's for questions. You ask it direct, specific things like 'how do I do in ' and it provides a fast answer.

People have many more questions in their life than they do queries.

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#173

Post by jeffbee »

John7878781 wrote: post #4

AI mode isn't that terrible.

AI summary isn't bad at all, but people don't understand it and Google hasn't explained it very well. It is just RAG. It is a summarization of the documents that are on the first page of the SERP. People think it is answering their question independently, but that's not what it does. It takes the docs that are top ranked from web search and digests them.

The corresponding "AI overview" feature of Gmail is amazing. It digests the messages that match your search. Because it is using your own docs, the output is way better. Or, at least, mine is. Maybe your inbox is full of lies but mine isn't.

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#174

Post by bluefirebrand »

gruez wrote: post #137
malfist wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the same reason I read a book instead of just the plot summary on the back cover

You really want to read the author's life story when searching for a recipe? Or wade through some content marketing plug for some vacuum cleaner shop in Albuquerque when all you want to do is figure out how to change filters on your vacuum? There are definitely gems on the web out there, but chances are I'm not discovering them via search, and I'd rather get the straight answer from the AI.

All of this stuff is Google's fault in the first place with page ranking shit they built!

So now you're trusting them to provide the cure?

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#175

Post by apparent »

I wonder if the 28% more visits was mostly among existing users. I skimmed the article and it didn't look like this was broken out. It would be much more impactful/impressive if they brought in a bunch of new users, as opposed to ratcheting up usage among people who were already aware of it.

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#176

Post by input_sh »

bko wrote: post #21

> Just for a start, visits to its AI-free search page noai.duckduckgo.com between May 20 to May 25 are said to have increased by 22.7% on average week-on-week, with the figures peaking May 24 at 27.7%. > The DuckDuckGo mobile app saw installs spike in the US by 18.1% on average compared to the previous week. TechCrunch reported this growth was sustained over six days, peaking at 30.5% on May 25. An even greater numbe…

They used to have public-facing relative figures located on /traffic, but it looks like they got rid of that page some years back and now it just redirects to the homepage.

Random snapshot of what it looked like: https://web.archive.org/web/20220101023001/https://duckduckg...

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#177

Post by bagol »

cryo32 wrote: post #128
bagol wrote: post #124

Duckduckgo is blocked in my country. Reddit is blocked in my country. My country is also one of first countries agree to ban free (non playstore) android app installation. My country is so against freedom. What a shitty country.

Which country did this so I can avoid the hell out of it? Also sorry!

Indonesia

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#178

Post by ben_w »

hilariously wrote: post #160
leereeves wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can also tell the LLM exactly what you have in the fridge or what allergies you have and get customized recipes. Can you really though? Are the results delicious? I've never tried that.

It's worse than you think, many recipe sites do not taste test their stuff at all, and often have very stupid instructions. That being said, an LLM can give creative ideas, mix and match components, but you should not trust the details at all.

Case in point, when "minced meat" and "mincemeat" were mixed up: https://metro.co.uk/2019/12/09/american-website-includes-act...

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#179

Post by wetpaws »

shevy-java wrote: post #63

I am trying to find a replacement for google search. DuckDuckGo was also useless. Qwant just copy/pastes Google's awful UI. We kind of see that all search engines suck now, but in many cases there is no real reason why that should be the case. For instance, why did Qwant copy/paste Google's horrible UI? There is no logical reason for this other than trying to bait in people who like the Google search UI. I don't like…

[dead]

Re: DuckDuckGo search saw 28% more visits after Google said people love AI mode

#180

Post by WarmWash »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #159
WarmWash wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It started when Google made a hard push to improve search for everyday people. They essentially nerfed "expert google skills" to bolster "noob google skills". Regular people are/were really bad at using google, so google moved towards showing what it thinks you want rather than what you want. They paved over the skill gap between people who understood keywords and word order, and people who just typed in a quasi legi…

>"a hard push to improve search for everyday people" Citation needed. A hard push to change their search offering, sure. To improve it? Well, if by improve you mean 'require more interaction and viewing of more adverts on average before leaving' ...

Again, if you have been on HN since 2009, you are likely on the far fringe of Google's user demographics, which at this point is pretty much "The average human being on Earth".

I would bet all of my money that you never once did a Google search (pre-LLM mania, but maybe even after) that looked like

"What kind of clothing is best for when you are going hiking around the lake, so my feet don't get so cold?"

Sadly, this is how most humans have used a search engine for decades now.

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