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All? At first, lower quality? I think you massively underestimate how much investment is required to produce even a basic search engine, let alone one that eve

All? At first, lower quality? I think you massively underestimate how much investment is required to produce even a basic search engine, let alone one that eventually catches up to what Google has produced. And that's just search. Now throw in Gmail, Maps, Android, Chrome, etc ... these are international collaborations for a reason.

pjc50 11y ago
There are plenty of replacements for all of those except Android. Multiple browsers, various mapping companies (including OpenStreetMap), multiple email providers, multiple browser vendors. There's also Bing, and the various ancient abandoned former greats of search: Altavista (now Yahoo), Lycos.
- nostrebored 11y ago
  Pretending that things come close to the richness of features in GMaps is ridiculous. Topographical maps for cyclists, amazing transit maps with descriptions of stops, reliable use internationally (google maps is still amazing in places like Indonesia) and a generally good list of hours, restaurants, queries like 'near me'... I think that other products are far and away worse every time that I am linked to them. Even people on HN who mention trying to use other search engines talk about having to frequently come back to google to find the result that they need. Whether that's us 'learning to Google' or Google being a superior product is up for debate.
- bad_user 11y ago
  Not sure if you noticed, but all alternative search engines, like Bing and DDG, are absolutely terrible in Europe. And this isn't an overstatement.
m_t 11y ago
There are already working search engine alternative, from Qwant to bing. One can definitely live without google as a search engine.
x0x0 11y ago
Replacements exist for all of them. search: bing, yandex, baidu, naver email: fastmail, hotmail, yandex email maps: bing maps, nokia maps, open street maps (or whatever the collaboration is called) browser: firefox, etc

pjc50 11y ago

There are plenty of replacements for all of those except Android. Multiple browsers, various mapping companies (including OpenStreetMap), multiple email providers, multiple browser vendors. There's also Bing, and the various ancient abandoned former greats of search: Altavista (now Yahoo), Lycos.

nostrebored 11y ago
Pretending that things come close to the richness of features in GMaps is ridiculous. Topographical maps for cyclists, amazing transit maps with descriptions of stops, reliable use internationally (google maps is still amazing in places like Indonesia) and a generally good list of hours, restaurants, queries like 'near me'... I think that other products are far and away worse every time that I am linked to them. Even people on HN who mention trying to use other search engines talk about having to frequently come back to google to find the result that they need. Whether that's us 'learning to Google' or Google being a superior product is up for debate.
bad_user 11y ago
Not sure if you noticed, but all alternative search engines, like Bing and DDG, are absolutely terrible in Europe. And this isn't an overstatement.

m_t 11y ago

There are already working search engine alternative, from Qwant to bing. One can definitely live without google as a search engine.

x0x0 11y ago

Replacements exist for all of them. search: bing, yandex, baidu, naver email: fastmail, hotmail, yandex email maps: bing maps, nokia maps, open street maps (or whatever the collaboration is called) browser: firefox, etc