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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

#451

Post by tardedmeme »

1718627440 wrote: post #418
al_borland wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After-the-fact opt-outs are something I never trust. Most data selling is opt-in and requires the user to opt-out. It seems to me that when I submit the form, the data would be instantly sold and by the time I get to the opt-out form it’s too late. If this isn’t how it works, I’d be interested to know. The whole idea of these opt-outs seem like smoke and mirrors to act good while still gaining the advantage from the…

The GDPR specifies that opt-outs are also retroactive, but of course we know that all corporations happily follow the law.

Corporations seem deathly scared of GDPR, for some reason, while in reality it's enforced about as much as American antitrust (not at all).

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

#452

Post by tardedmeme »

ThunderSizzle wrote: post #441
sznio wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>But why the fuck should any company pay for an ad when the user explicitly searched for their product? If you don't buy out the top-place for the query, someone else will. In a better case a competitor - imagine Facebook Marketplace being the top result for "ebay". In the worst - a phishing site. The latter happens quite often for software searches.

Right, but that's because Google permits that. OP is saying Google should simply stop permitting advertising over the real answer.

Why would Google give themselves less money?

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

#453

Post by kungp »

watwut wrote: post #250
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…

> driving an increase in total search queries I search more when I cant find the thing I am looking for. I search less when I find the thing I am looking for. Second, it takes additional effort to not do AI search.

Yeah, seems obvious that more searches = results are worse. Who would go "Google sure is good nowadays, I'm gonna ask it for more things than I used to"

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

#454

Post by cassianoleal »

1718627440 wrote: post #418
al_borland wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After-the-fact opt-outs are something I never trust. Most data selling is opt-in and requires the user to opt-out. It seems to me that when I submit the form, the data would be instantly sold and by the time I get to the opt-out form it’s too late. If this isn’t how it works, I’d be interested to know. The whole idea of these opt-outs seem like smoke and mirrors to act good while still gaining the advantage from the…

The GDPR specifies that opt-outs are also retroactive, but of course we know that all corporations happily follow the law.

You can’t un-sell data though. Sure you may ask nicely that the buyer doesn’t use it and deletes it, but at that point the cat’s out of the bag.

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

#456

Post by codewench »

fhd2 wrote: post #443
data-ottawa wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The AI product rollouts in the last two years have been some of the most aggressive and user hostile product rollouts in my entire life. All conventions and user centricity go out the window with AI feature launches lately. If you look at examples from the last week it’s stuff like posthogs opt-out training, Copilot training, or Google’s antigravity chat-app switch. I’ve had the worst customer experiences of my life…

One fascinating thing about LLMs is the degree of evangelism it inspires in some. You can explain some of that with paid micro influencers, people invested in the success of AI, consultants looking for workshop opportunities and all that, but I know enough people with no skin in the game at all, that turned into very vocal advocates. I think to some degree, that effect is also at play here. CEOs, product managers etc…

You also have to consider a ( I would argue large ) percentage of those evangelists are simply lying for financial gain. They see profit, or at least reduced costs, and quite simply don't give a shit about customer experience or anything like that.

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

#457

Post by simmerup »

jve wrote: post #444
andersonpico wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've yet to meet anyone outside that likes AI except for manager or when people are pretending for their bosses at work. It became a survival tactic.

My brother with no programming experience took some AI courses and automated adding products to his ecommerce site from his suppliers. Fetches images, converts them, categorizes, adds descriptions/specs in multiple languages translated via DeepL API, calculates prices. He also tries to troubleshoot/debug stuff without calling me... and just asking me to choose right path offered by AI. I love it :) Because I usually…

And the customer of his site gets a bunch of AI generated rubbish

Could be correct, could be not, who cares?

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

#458

Post by dopidopHN2 »

al_borland wrote: post #5

My friends who previously had no interest in technology and never talked about it, are suddenly following tech news closely all because they hate AI being pushed so hard. One was just messaging me this morning about alternatives to Google search and maps. He ended up downloading DuckDuckGo. If Google isn’t carefully they’re going to push people away from their golden goose.

Been using Google since they exists. I stopped without any issue and even thinking too much about it 2 years ago.

This include work.

I use DDG, kagy and the LLM du jour .

Again, no friction. No plan. No transition période. I just changed the default search engine on a whim.

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

#459

Post by PAndreew »

frr149 wrote: post #375

We have all overused a single solution to "finding stuff on the web": the search engine. Now it's dying, killed by AI and by Google's greed. There's no alternative left, no webrings, no web directories. If all your content is now only on your server, you're invisible.

I already submitted my take on this to Show HN: https://currantfeed.cc/. Noone gave a shit so it's most likely a very bad idea and certainly a very steep uphill battle. It's basically an Airbnb for websites that by default randomly sorts them and then you can filter by different attributes. Owners have to submit and maintain their "listings". It does have an optional subscription (I'm not sure if it works haven't tested it).

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

#460

Post by xinayder »

I remember when I watched a presentation from a Google engineer at a summer school for AI tech last year and I asked why Google shipped AI slop when no one wanted it. He tried to gaslight me saying "users like this feature", and I told him to look up every major forum on the web, there is not a single good comment about Gemini being forced on. Then he said it was just an A/B testing and that not everyone had it enabled by default.

I wouldn't be surprised if they made up the statistics to justify the enslopification.

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