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Disclaimer: I work for DDG. I'd be interested in looking into any examples of searches where the results aren't good enough or where it seems to have gotten wo

Disclaimer: I work for DDG. I'd be interested in looking into any examples of searches where the results aren't good enough or where it seems to have gotten worse recently. As far as I know there haven't been any changes over the past few weeks that would have made things worse.

Shanea93 9y ago
Why does DDG only seem to search videos via Youtube, even with Safe Search set to off? I live in the UK and with our internet laws here becoming more and more strict over the last few (and coming) years, I wanted an alternative to Google or Bing who both actively cooperate with the governments existing proclivity to censor things like Porn. Bing's video search for pornography is absolutely fantastic, it's legitimately the one thing I use Bing for.
- bsstoner 9y ago
  Thanks for the feedback. We only return videos from YouTube right now, but expanding that is definitely something we'd like to do in the future.
- prathiks 9y ago
  I guess its a right time to try bing. Will do the next time i have a urge
kjsujwai 9y ago
thank you for bangs. changed my entire web browsing experience.
pmoriarty 9y ago
Here's one I searched for just today: "helium" "futures" DDG returns 2 results.[1] Google returns 369,000.[2] Here's another one: "opec" "rebalancing" "peak" DDG returns 0 results.[3] Google returns 319,000.[4] There have been many, many others. I can email you them as I run in to them, if you want. Just let me know what email address to use. Also, just to clarify, I noticed the change maybe 3 or 4 months (not weeks) ago. [1] - https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="helium"%20"futures"&kd=-1 https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="helium"%20"futures"&kd=-1 [2] - https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%22futures%22 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%... [3] - https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="opec"%20"rebalancing"%20"peak"&kd=-1 https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="opec"%20"rebalancing"%20"pea... [4] - https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22rebalancing%22%20%22peak%22 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22...
- bsstoner 9y ago
  Thanks, these are helpful. Is it mostly searches with quoted words? brian@duckduckgo.com
  - pmoriarty 9y ago
    Yeah, I use quotes a lot because otherwise I find the results are pretty poor (ie. they seem to be more likely to miss at least one of the terms I searched for, and if I'm searching for a phrase then an unquoted phrase could have its words scattered all over the place rather than be treated as a phrase).
    - bsstoner 9y ago
      This was in fact an issue with queries containing quotes on our /lite and /html sites. It should be fixed now. Let me know if you see any other issues. What happened is we frequently get hit by bots trying to scrape the links from our /lite and /html sites and we have to react by creating rules to try to block them. This particular rule, was over-aggressive. Our ops team is going to discuss internally how to prevent something like this from happening again. Thanks!
      - pmoriarty 9y ago
        Thank you. I appreciate you responding personally, taking this seriously, and providing a quick fix.
- larma 9y ago
  I guess the problem only occurs with the lite version? At least for me, removing the /lite/ part in the URL results in far more results.
- phireal 9y ago
  Just be aware that Google's "hits" number is a wild overestimate. For example, the "helium" "futures" search actually only returns 222 pages (which is obviously still much higher than DDG): https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%22futures%22#q=%22helium%22+%22futures%22&hl=en&start=213 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%.... Likewise, the "opec" "rebalancing" "peak" returns only 264: https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22rebalancing%22%20%22peak%22#q=%22opec%22+%22rebalancing%22+%22peak%22&hl=en&start=254 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22...

Shanea93 9y ago

Why does DDG only seem to search videos via Youtube, even with Safe Search set to off? I live in the UK and with our internet laws here becoming more and more strict over the last few (and coming) years, I wanted an alternative to Google or Bing who both actively cooperate with the governments existing proclivity to censor things like Porn. Bing's video search for pornography is absolutely fantastic, it's legitimately the one thing I use Bing for.

bsstoner 9y ago
Thanks for the feedback. We only return videos from YouTube right now, but expanding that is definitely something we'd like to do in the future.
prathiks 9y ago
I guess its a right time to try bing. Will do the next time i have a urge

kjsujwai 9y ago

thank you for bangs. changed my entire web browsing experience.

pmoriarty 9y ago

Here's one I searched for just today: "helium" "futures" DDG returns 2 results.[1] Google returns 369,000.[2] Here's another one: "opec" "rebalancing" "peak" DDG returns 0 results.[3] Google returns 319,000.[4] There have been many, many others. I can email you them as I run in to them, if you want. Just let me know what email address to use. Also, just to clarify, I noticed the change maybe 3 or 4 months (not weeks) ago. [1] - https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="helium"%20"futures"&kd=-1 https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="helium"%20"futures"&kd=-1 [2] - https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%22futures%22 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%... [3] - https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="opec"%20"rebalancing"%20"peak"&kd=-1 https://duckduckgo.com/lite/?q="opec"%20"rebalancing"%20"pea... [4] - https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22rebalancing%22%20%22peak%22 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22...

bsstoner 9y ago
Thanks, these are helpful. Is it mostly searches with quoted words? brian@duckduckgo.com
- pmoriarty 9y ago
  Yeah, I use quotes a lot because otherwise I find the results are pretty poor (ie. they seem to be more likely to miss at least one of the terms I searched for, and if I'm searching for a phrase then an unquoted phrase could have its words scattered all over the place rather than be treated as a phrase).
  - bsstoner 9y ago
    This was in fact an issue with queries containing quotes on our /lite and /html sites. It should be fixed now. Let me know if you see any other issues. What happened is we frequently get hit by bots trying to scrape the links from our /lite and /html sites and we have to react by creating rules to try to block them. This particular rule, was over-aggressive. Our ops team is going to discuss internally how to prevent something like this from happening again. Thanks!
    - pmoriarty 9y ago
      Thank you. I appreciate you responding personally, taking this seriously, and providing a quick fix.
larma 9y ago
I guess the problem only occurs with the lite version? At least for me, removing the /lite/ part in the URL results in far more results.
phireal 9y ago
Just be aware that Google's "hits" number is a wild overestimate. For example, the "helium" "futures" search actually only returns 222 pages (which is obviously still much higher than DDG): https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%22futures%22#q=%22helium%22+%22futures%22&hl=en&start=213 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22helium%22%20%.... Likewise, the "opec" "rebalancing" "peak" returns only 264: https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22rebalancing%22%20%22peak%22#q=%22opec%22+%22rebalancing%22+%22peak%22&hl=en&start=254 https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22opec%22%20%22...