5 ms·

Likewise. Step up YC people!

skinkestek 6y ago
As has been said by someone before: There's a billion dollar niche waiting for the right company: - make a search engine that works - show text ads clearly distinguishable from results - play nice, and maybe even use use a cool slogan like "we're not evil" or something (it used to be someone else's but it seems they don't use it anymore ;-)
- passerby1 6y ago
  Do I understand correct that duckduckgo is there already?
  - ErrrNoMate 6y ago
    It's not a search engine, it's just something built on top of Bing. We need something independent to cut through this, it can't have these ties.
    - Satam 6y ago
      Independence on its own, would not be a competitive advantage. In reality, for the most part, people do not care enough about minor privacy violations. The outrage you see online rarely bleeds into the average user's day-to-day decisions. I wonder how the next disruptive innovation is going to look in the search engine market?
      - fauigerzigerk 6y ago
        >I wonder how the next disruptive innovation is going to look in the search engine market? I think the search engine market will always be very closely linked to content distribution platforms. If the decentralised web continues to degenerate into an oligopoly of walled gardens then there will be no search engine market in the current sense. We will just use the search function provided by each platform. I believe the question we have to ask is what the next disruptive content distribution platform is going to look like and whether that disruption can be anything more than yet another oligopolist stealing some share from the encumbents before getting bought by one of them (or not).
    - lopis 6y ago
      Do you realize how expensive and hard it is to build a search engine from scratch? It's not a coincidence that only state-size corporations have been able to keep a high quality web index going. Cliqz tried and struggled hard, until they decided to shut down. It's not a "market ripe for disruption". It's maybe the market with the highest barrier of entry in tech.
  - skinkestek 6y ago
    That's what I use as default. But IMO it is a far cry from 2007 Google and only holds a candle because Google has nerfed itself. And sadly, much of it isn't because they don't have resources for AI or even larger index but because of the same QA issues that Google has struggled with: - including results that doesn't contain my search terms / too much fuzzing - ignoring double quotes Both probably in order to please the mythical ordinary/average user I guess. Guess what: techies got me to change to startup Google and I guess we will get people to change to another search engine as soon as one is ready. In the meantime I use DDG. The difference is mostly negligible now and when it isn't it is 20 times faster (I don't think this is hyperbole) to mash in a !g at the end of my DDG search than the other way around. FTR: same goes for browsers. For me Firefox has always been best, but they have nerfed themselves and keep ignoring us techies to such a degree that I will - if necessary - pay monthly to get a safe, supported version of the same with my old extensions working, but not to Mozilla Foundation, only to the Corporation (the ones who create the browser) or someone else.
- ColinHayhurst 6y ago
  Self-disclosure: Mojeek CEO. On your points: - Our search engine works and has been doing so for >15 years. Our search quality needs improving but does so gradually. And it's independent; our own crawler, index and infrastructure - We just introduced non-tracking search ads: https://www.mojeek.com/support/ads/ https://www.mojeek.com/support/ads/ - We use "No Tracking , Just Search" and "Search without Surveillance" We've been building for 15 years; here's our founder story: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26502140 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26502140
  - eitland 6y ago
    Wohoo! Just tested, what a refreshing change! - simple and clean - gives me exact results, i.e. empty set when I search for something deliberately misspelled or non-existent That said it seems to struggle with hyphens, see the two last queries below. Here are my test queries: - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrybsgr%C3%B8t https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrybsgr%C3%B8t (misspelled, sent it anyway). Result: empty set, which is correct - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrynsgr%C3%B8t https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrynsgr%C3%B8t (local porridge) Result: plenty of relevant looking results - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=elefantfelle https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=elefantfelle (Norwegian for elephant trap) Result: empty set. (But DDG can find some pages.) - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=Honningsv%C3%A5g+ https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=Honningsv%C3%A5g+ (town in Northern Norway). Result: interesting, but relevant. Nice card at the top with relevant information from Wikipedia - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=react+hooks https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=react+hooks Result: relevant results, two in a language that I rarely read (German) or cannot read (French?) - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=%22mat-table%22 https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=%22mat-table%22 Result: not a single relevant result on the front page (!) - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=mat-table https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=mat-table Result: not a single relevant result on the front page
    - ColinHayhurst 6y ago
      Thanks for very useful feedback; always good to have. We'll look at those.
  - 6y ago

As has been said by someone before: There's a billion dollar niche waiting for the right company: - make a search engine that works - show text ads clearly distinguishable from results - play nice, and maybe even use use a cool slogan like "we're not evil" or something (it used to be someone else's but it seems they don't use it anymore ;-)

passerby1 6y ago
Do I understand correct that duckduckgo is there already?
- ErrrNoMate 6y ago
  It's not a search engine, it's just something built on top of Bing. We need something independent to cut through this, it can't have these ties.
  - Satam 6y ago
    Independence on its own, would not be a competitive advantage. In reality, for the most part, people do not care enough about minor privacy violations. The outrage you see online rarely bleeds into the average user's day-to-day decisions. I wonder how the next disruptive innovation is going to look in the search engine market?
    - fauigerzigerk 6y ago
      >I wonder how the next disruptive innovation is going to look in the search engine market? I think the search engine market will always be very closely linked to content distribution platforms. If the decentralised web continues to degenerate into an oligopoly of walled gardens then there will be no search engine market in the current sense. We will just use the search function provided by each platform. I believe the question we have to ask is what the next disruptive content distribution platform is going to look like and whether that disruption can be anything more than yet another oligopolist stealing some share from the encumbents before getting bought by one of them (or not).
  - lopis 6y ago
    Do you realize how expensive and hard it is to build a search engine from scratch? It's not a coincidence that only state-size corporations have been able to keep a high quality web index going. Cliqz tried and struggled hard, until they decided to shut down. It's not a "market ripe for disruption". It's maybe the market with the highest barrier of entry in tech.
- skinkestek 6y ago
  That's what I use as default. But IMO it is a far cry from 2007 Google and only holds a candle because Google has nerfed itself. And sadly, much of it isn't because they don't have resources for AI or even larger index but because of the same QA issues that Google has struggled with: - including results that doesn't contain my search terms / too much fuzzing - ignoring double quotes Both probably in order to please the mythical ordinary/average user I guess. Guess what: techies got me to change to startup Google and I guess we will get people to change to another search engine as soon as one is ready. In the meantime I use DDG. The difference is mostly negligible now and when it isn't it is 20 times faster (I don't think this is hyperbole) to mash in a !g at the end of my DDG search than the other way around. FTR: same goes for browsers. For me Firefox has always been best, but they have nerfed themselves and keep ignoring us techies to such a degree that I will - if necessary - pay monthly to get a safe, supported version of the same with my old extensions working, but not to Mozilla Foundation, only to the Corporation (the ones who create the browser) or someone else.
ColinHayhurst 6y ago
Self-disclosure: Mojeek CEO. On your points: - Our search engine works and has been doing so for >15 years. Our search quality needs improving but does so gradually. And it's independent; our own crawler, index and infrastructure - We just introduced non-tracking search ads: https://www.mojeek.com/support/ads/ https://www.mojeek.com/support/ads/ - We use "No Tracking , Just Search" and "Search without Surveillance" We've been building for 15 years; here's our founder story: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26502140 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26502140
- eitland 6y ago
  Wohoo! Just tested, what a refreshing change! - simple and clean - gives me exact results, i.e. empty set when I search for something deliberately misspelled or non-existent That said it seems to struggle with hyphens, see the two last queries below. Here are my test queries: - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrybsgr%C3%B8t https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrybsgr%C3%B8t (misspelled, sent it anyway). Result: empty set, which is correct - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrynsgr%C3%B8t https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=byggrynsgr%C3%B8t (local porridge) Result: plenty of relevant looking results - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=elefantfelle https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=elefantfelle (Norwegian for elephant trap) Result: empty set. (But DDG can find some pages.) - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=Honningsv%C3%A5g+ https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=Honningsv%C3%A5g+ (town in Northern Norway). Result: interesting, but relevant. Nice card at the top with relevant information from Wikipedia - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=react+hooks https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=react+hooks Result: relevant results, two in a language that I rarely read (German) or cannot read (French?) - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=%22mat-table%22 https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=%22mat-table%22 Result: not a single relevant result on the front page (!) - https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=mat-table https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=mat-table Result: not a single relevant result on the front page
  - ColinHayhurst 6y ago
    Thanks for very useful feedback; always good to have. We'll look at those.
- 6y ago