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Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

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Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#401

Post by rglullis »

mancerayder wrote: post #295
WarmWash wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody wants to pay for anything, so the services that figured out how to profit from people not paying will win. There was this idea born in the late '90's/early 00's that everything digital should be free. The internet was dominated by teenagers with no job and no credit card, so it made sense. But the result of that has been a whole generation with an allergy to compensation, and the inability for anyone to compet…

That's a really curious perspective. There are a few different angles of attack here, but let's start with this: it WAS free because people were making free content. Before the Internet we were hosting free BBSes (look those up), we then hosted websites which we made ourselves when the Internet was commercialized, and we paid for services like games where it made sense. You'd buy software you'd own forever (like Phot…

BBS were only amateur efforts. Linux would not go anywhere if it was not for IBM famously investing 1 billion in 2000.

You can get some development and innovations built purely on "free", but without actual professionals who can make a living by developing these systems, they never take off to reach the masses. The best example is social media and the Fediverse.

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#402

Post by levhawk »

mort96 wrote: post #397
levhawk wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Yandex was effectively seized by Ru govt "friends" and turned into propaganda tool. And that's very unfortunate. But I'm not talking about getting the propaganda, only about search index. About money - don't think this income is even remotely comparable with oil/gas incomes, which EU passes to RU. Please don't start political debate. I do not like censorship of any kind, hence my initial response. I want to have…

Please don't pretend I'm turning this into a "political debate". Your position is, "Kagi ought to keep doing business with Russia". That in itself is highly political. No side of this issue is apolitical.

My position was more about access to information, that business side for me is secondary, as unavoidable evil. If kagi will find a ru-index with decent quality, I'll be more than happier. Right now yandex has the best index, but given the decay of ru tech sector now, especially now when it's oligarch-managed, that might not be for long.

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#403

Post by BrunoBernardino »

prism56 wrote: post #391
BrunoBernardino wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks! Reach out for any suggestions, questions, or comments!

Does it index new reddit content? I refuse to use Google, DDG doesn't seem to surface much new reddit content. Currently settled on Kagi but the price is a little steep, happy to support EU based services.

I'm sure some of our providers do, but I can check, if you don't want to. What would be a search that would reveal that?

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#404

Post by bobajeff »

asciimoo wrote: post #122

Ohi, I'm the author of the open source Searx metasearch engine. I'm working on a self-hosted search service called Hister with the same goal when I started Searx development: reduce dependence on online search engines. Hister is a full text indexer for websites and local files which automatically saves all the visited pages rendered by your browser. It provides a flexible web (and terminal) search interface & query l…

This is great news!

Hister sounds like a idea I had years ago but gave up on after running into issues with index size taking up way too much storage.

Long ago I've used Searx and really liked it but after some point didn't see the point as opposed to using Google more directly. But lately in the back of my mind I've thinking about checking in on it again.

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#405

Post by acdha »

mock-possum wrote: post #192

I appear to be one of the rare few that doesn’t have any trouble - or even see much difference - in the ‘new’ google (non-) search. Maybe this is a frog in boiling water situation but… it’s just the same search as it’s always been, there’s just now a chunk of Gemini up top, that you take with a grain of salt, same way you’d take the promoted results. If you don’t like it, Adblock it. When I ask myself honestly, has g…

It’s unambiguously worse, in part because they backed away from spam filtering after merging with Double Click when the SEO parasites started buying tons of AdWords. There were multiple years where they’d rank the sites which scraped Stack Overflow, GitHub, Wikipedia, etc. higher than the sources, which is not a problem on Kagi in general but also one Kagi doesn’t refuse to give you tools to solve: a Kagi user can block low-quality domains and never see them again. Google not only doesn’t offer the option but if you ever click on a spam site they’ll treat that as a sign that you want more.

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#406

Post by tokai »

nobodywasishere wrote: post #162
rpdillon wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I paid for Kagi for a bit, but got a weird vibe when I realized they were working pretty hard to paper over the fact that they pay a third party to scrape Google search results for them. The public-facing side of that coin is Kagi's position that Google should make their index available to competitors (see https://blog.kagi.com/waiting-dawn-search ). All that's to say: when I paid for Kagi, I thought I was investing…

> didn't realize Kagi had no aspirations to build their own general purpose index Kagi employee here. We're actively working on building our own indexes beyond the limited ones we have now, not just a general index but also purpose built indexes for things like programming, etc.

So you will stop buying Yandex data at some point?

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#408

Post by nosioptar »

JSR_FDED wrote: post #368
nosioptar wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they were working pretty hard to paper over the fact that they pay a third party to scrape Google Not the least bit surprising to me. I had the misfortune of talking to Kagi's CEO several years ago. Every word out of his mouth was a lie. Kagi's the one search company I trust less than Google.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence

I don't walk around recording every conversation I have.

I'd also argue that calling a tech CEO a liar is far from extraordinary. It'd be extraordinary if I accused him of honesty.

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#409

Post by tokai »

mystraline wrote: post #311
amelius wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kagi uses Yandex which is Russian.

Yandex is great if youre searching for pirated content or for DMCA'd content that ended up on Gitflic.ru Anti-drm tools are a big case in point. And so is Bypass Paywalls Clean Firefox plugin. All of these have been purged from the "Great American Corporate Firewall". Russian people != Russian govt != Russian companies. I just use the tools that work.

[flagged]

Re: Search engines alternatives now that Google isn't Google anymore

#410

Post by tokai »

martinsb wrote: post #230
d12bb wrote: post #7

I switched to Kagi little over a year ago and couldn’t recommend it enough. The search results are actually what I’m searching for, there is AI for the occasions I want it (and only then), and it comes with nice extras like search personalization and a great translation app. Tried to live without it when my first year of subscription ran out, but I didn’t last long…

Does Kagi still use Yandex index behind the scenes? If this is true, then certain fraction of the payment goes to Russian Federation and financing its war and genocide in Ukraine. This is the reason I have to refrain from using this otherwise excellent service.

HN users really hate this piece of truth.
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