But doesn't DDG just repackage results from Yahoo (now Bing)? At least, it was doing that a few years ago when I last checked.
DuckDuckGo vs Google
231–240 of 558 posts
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#232"Google would be an elephant while DuckDuckGo is a mosquito (this is not to emphasize; I’m actually making things better for DuckDuckGo)." Why would this guy go out of his way to say this metaphor is actually literally informative and generous towards DuckDuckGo while apparently having exerted no mental effort and being incorrect by orders of magnitude on his own data? If you're most generous to the writer, you get 1…
I know you kind of overdid it a bit, but that's exactly the kind of stuff that distracts me for an hour, because I have to do the same math you did. Nicely done and good to see that DuckDuckGo is already a hyena, rather than a mosquito.
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#233People are conditioned to think Search has to work online. This was true when Google was created. No one had the processing or memory available on their desktop to search an entire index of the "useful" web. Not anymore. How large is a "useful" index of the web today? And can it fit on your laptop? The answer is yes. Can the entire thing be queried fast? The answer is yes. As an example take the entire stackexchange…
I don't think search is as simple as grepping a ton of files. Search Google for "movie where people can't have babies" and the #1 result is Children of Men. I think that's one area where Google pulls ahead of its competition is accurate results to vague queries like that and I think you need a lot of collected data from searches to provide that.
That result is pretty spectacular! I wonder if this is something general or related to their seemingly bespoke categorisation of movies.
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#234People are conditioned to think Search has to work online. This was true when Google was created. No one had the processing or memory available on their desktop to search an entire index of the "useful" web. Not anymore. How large is a "useful" index of the web today? And can it fit on your laptop? The answer is yes. Can the entire thing be queried fast? The answer is yes. As an example take the entire stackexchange…
That works for Wikipedia type knowledge, yes. But not for finding random blog posts from yesterday, or reddit or HN discussions.
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#235I tried DDG several times over the years before finally sticking with it about 2 years ago. Now it feels weird to go back to Google because I've gotten used to using some of the bangs.
I love DDG and what they stand for, and I'll gladly trade the creepy personalized results for the more organic results I get there.
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#236Earlier quoted context omitted.
That was one of the most HN comments I've ever read. Hey, it's just a metaphor. Scales and ratios not needed. edit: Wasn't meant to be negative ... as I could see myself writing something like that and my GF giggling at me for a week ...
The idea of a metaphor is to give you a more clear and ideally accurate understanding of something.
But doing that doesn't necessarily involves calculating a precise measurement of the ratios present in the metaphor. Human language conveys lots of meaning by evocative imaginery, too, so not all expressions should be taken literally.
Sometimes, taking the literal meaning might even distort the original message, like in this case changing the mosquito with a goose - if that had been the original expression, everyone would have wondered why the author chose such strange comparison.
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#237Recently switched over to DuckDuckGo on all my devices. Tried to do the same thing several years ago and found it didn't really work out, but this time around it is so much better, both when it comes to speed and results. If anyone has doubts because they tried it years ago, I'd say go for it again.
Ditto, for the past month or two. I'd love to get off of Gmail and Google drive, as well, but that's a longer term project. Main reason: concerns about tracking and privacy. Secondarily: politics. DDG so far has been acceptable. As long as they keep their political opinions to themselves, the honeymoon will continue. My love affair with Google, on the other hand, is over. :(
If you don't send a lot of emails but receive a lot and need many aliases you might wanna check out https://migadu.com
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#238Recently switched over to DuckDuckGo on all my devices. Tried to do the same thing several years ago and found it didn't really work out, but this time around it is so much better, both when it comes to speed and results. If anyone has doubts because they tried it years ago, I'd say go for it again.
I did the same too 2 months. If I can't it, I'll give yahoo and bing a chance first before Google. There really hasn't been much that I can't find with the first 3.
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#239Use search engine[1] that respects[2] your privacy [1] https://www.ixquick.eu/ [2] https://www.ixquick.eu/eng/privacy-policy.html#hmb
The results are terrible. I tried a simple search for a large Porsche dealership which is down the street from my house and it did not even come up in the top 5 results.
Would be a great search engine if it was the year 2001.
Re: DuckDuckGo vs Google
#240People are conditioned to think Search has to work online. This was true when Google was created. No one had the processing or memory available on their desktop to search an entire index of the "useful" web. Not anymore. How large is a "useful" index of the web today? And can it fit on your laptop? The answer is yes. Can the entire thing be queried fast? The answer is yes. As an example take the entire stackexchange…
How would you keep the index up to date? How quickly would news stories appear in it and stale links disappear? Are you going to read the entire internet every day to keep it current?
maybe you could pull down changes on a daily basis? not a complete reindex but just updates that prune dead links and add new ones.
the problem is this would be completely useless for current events. but querying sites you use regularly, this could be an option. I often end a google search with modifiers like "wikipedia" or "reddit" or "stackoverflow". If I could store indexes to those sites offline that might be useful.
The creator of this offline search could potentially make money by indexing shopping sites like Amazon, eBay, etc with affiliate links.