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The next Google

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Re: The next Google

#261

Post by dave_sullivan »

nate wrote: post #254
Barrin92 wrote: post #45

I think 'more customization' which is a theme with a lot of these alternatives is a fundamental dead end. I don't know where this persistent myth comes from that people love choice and tinkering, because they clearly don't. There's a huge cost associated with having to make choices, and one feature of successful modern apps is that they're frictionless. That's why TikTok is so successful. There's no login, no user ch…

There's a book I love to send people: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001REFRZG/ref=dp-kindle-redirect (old school. no kindle. just hardcover. :) ) "Something Really New" How innovation works. First question in the book is: you need to come up with a new idea for a faucet company. Customer research says: Users want lots of variety in their faucets. Everyone then immediately comes up with the same exact ideas: faucets that…

Of course blog and SEO spam is such a problem on Google now that it looks more similar to your Pre Google steps.

I don't know how to easily fix that though. Simply "crawling the entire internet" is still not a simple problem, let alone doing something more useful with the result than google can. Ahrefs is an interesting business but not what people mean when they say the next google. "Machine learning" but I think google is all over this already (and has been for years).

Google does a bad job at getting user feedback about results while reddit does better so people search reddit, maybe a hybrid is an opportunity.

Re: The next Google

#262

Post by Engineering-MD »

hackernewds wrote: post #249
wormer wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea I always just put in the question I want into DDG and then just add reddit in the end. It's so much better than any blog or anything because at least it gives the semblance of real users giving their opinion.

What is DDG?

DuckDuckGo

Re: The next Google

#263

Post by emsixteen »

eitland wrote: post #192
chewz wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Give me links to websites. There are no more websites worth linking to anymore... If you filter out all SEO spam there is barely few webpages left... Google is desperately trying to hide that fact. Most of the web 1.0 can nowadays fit into small town telephone directory... You do not need mulitibilion dolar business to run web directory...

Try search.marginalia.nu (especially https://search.marginalia.nu/explore/random but try some searches for git commands or history too, just remember it is a search engine, not a conversation partner so only include words that should be in the article you search for) and come back to me afterwards. I thought like you that if even Google couldn't find anything it was not there, but after discovering marginalia I now k…

> search.marginalia.nu

This is just retrieving articles when I search, not actual websites. Interesting if you're looking for article related to search keywords I guess, but genuinely unusable for actually finding something specific.

Re: The next Google

#264

Post by KerryJones »

legohead wrote: post #98

I just went on a mini vacation to Vegas, and was thinking how nice it would be to just call up someone and ask for some simple advice. I did a bunch of online research before I booked things, but man was it painful. There are so many copy-cat blogs who just throw together a bunch of basic information with no real research done in order to get those clicks/adwords. For example: best hotel pool in vegas. Seems simple e…

Exact same experience except with Iceland. Google "top attractions in Iceland" and you get a bunch of garbage posts telling you about the Blue Lagoon. I ended up reading an entire book on iceland tourism and perusing many blogs and reaching out to many friends, and the Blue Lagoon is definitely not one of the top spots.

Re: The next Google

#265

Post by wppick »

If there is any next Google (or Google Search competitor) it would be, in my mind, something like Wolfram Alpha. I can search for things like today + 160 days and get much more rich results (as a simple example). Google does have some features like this already such as weather/climate, calculator, translate, etc. This area however is much weaker than I would like it to be. Wolfram can tell me how long it will take me to get a sunburn in my current location, and all kinds of stuff like that. Virtual assistants like Siri and "OK Google" might be heading in this direction, but why can't I ask "Ok Google, I will take a photo, then can you compress it and send it as an email attachment to Dave from work." Or something along those lines...

Re: The next Google

#266

Post by robertlagrant »

Barrin92 wrote: post #45

I think 'more customization' which is a theme with a lot of these alternatives is a fundamental dead end. I don't know where this persistent myth comes from that people love choice and tinkering, because they clearly don't. There's a huge cost associated with having to make choices, and one feature of successful modern apps is that they're frictionless. That's why TikTok is so successful. There's no login, no user ch…

Possibly, but being able to add in your email and private services is interesting.

Crazy from a privacy perspective, but potentially very seductive in terms of convenience.

Re: The next Google

#267

Post by bob1029 »

Some days I wonder what would stop me writing my own web crawler and building my own damn search engine from scratch. I can't ever come up with a hard reason it wouldnt work in 2022, other than the dynamic javascript blogspam that may be more challenging to trawl for meaningful content these days. Perhaps this is a win-win: The shit I can't crawl I wouldnt want to read anyways.

Compete with google? Who gives a shit. I just want to be able to hit a full text index that points back to URLs. I don't need instant PhD-tier answers for life questions.

Re: The next Google

#268

Post by nuancebydefault »

eitland wrote: post #192
chewz wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Give me links to websites. There are no more websites worth linking to anymore... If you filter out all SEO spam there is barely few webpages left... Google is desperately trying to hide that fact. Most of the web 1.0 can nowadays fit into small town telephone directory... You do not need mulitibilion dolar business to run web directory...

Try search.marginalia.nu (especially https://search.marginalia.nu/explore/random but try some searches for git commands or history too, just remember it is a search engine, not a conversation partner so only include words that should be in the article you search for) and come back to me afterwards. I thought like you that if even Google couldn't find anything it was not there, but after discovering marginalia I now k…

Just searched for "linux users" in marginalia and google. Google's first answer seemed spot on. (users command usage); Marginalia provided me with in comparison _marginal_ results. Maybe it is because google knows me better then i am aware of. I really don't notice google results getting worse, while i read so several times in HN comments...

Re: The next Google

#269

Post by yumraj »

> The next Google can’t just be an input box that spits out links.

I have a fundamental disagreement with this. The best search engine is still an input box that spits out links based on what was typed. This allows the user to express what they're looking for, their query, in most natural terms.

Everything else is secondary. At least for me..

Re: The next Google

#270

Post by simulate-me »

baxtr wrote: post #225
idiotsecant wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The death of the web is because most people don't want what you want. They don't mind walled gardens, so long as they are easy to use and have the content and connections that they want to see. The audience of HN is extremely skewed towards preferring systems that allow tinkering but that's not what the market wants.

This. People don't realize that the early web was elitist. Now, the entire population is online. And, as you said, most people simply don't care about the stuff we care about. That's also why "Google's search results are soo bad." They're not. For the bulk of Google's visitors, they're good enough.

Desiring choice isn’t elitist. Early web adopters were passionate and willing to put in more work. Nothing wrong with that, and nothing wrong with liking simple default settings either.
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