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> This seems too handwavey - what concrete metrics would you use to evaluate the quality of a search engine? How about the metric in TFA? > Reddit has even mo

> This seems too handwavey - what concrete metrics would you use to evaluate the quality of a search engine? How about the metric in TFA? > Reddit has even more garbage than Google. Well, people disagree, and that's why they're searching reddit all the time now. > Reddit search doesn’t even do basic spell correction. You are missing the point.

endisneigh 5y ago
You’re missing the point - a popular sites own lack of internal search would explain the use of external search. The metric in the article does really define search results nor has it been used with other providers as well. I’d love to not use Bing/Google but no one has shown me something better.
- foxfluff 5y ago
  > You’re missing the point - a popular sites own lack of internal search would explain the use of external search. Sigh. The point is that 1) Google gives trash results by default 2) users know there are good results out there on the web, in particular on reddit 3) people append reddit to their google search query and suddenly good results start popping up 4) if google search wasn't trash by default, people would get good results without having to specifically direct the engine to reddit.
  - endisneigh 5y ago
    People use Google to search Reddit because Reddit has terrible search. Nothing more than that. Your other assertions would need to be proved more rigorously. Not just for Google, but for any search engine. Don’t know what’s so difficult to understand about that lol.
    - foxfluff 5y ago
      > People use Google to search Reddit because Reddit has terrible search. Hey why don't you prove your assertion. > Your other assertions would need to be proved more rigorously. Not just for Google, but for any search engine. These are not my assertions. It's a claim the fine article is making. And they're not the only one making that claim. Anecdotally a lot of people are saying they do this to get useful results because Google results are trash. For example: https://www.resetera.com/threads/google-search-is-just-trash-now.125691/#post-22235872 https://www.resetera.com/threads/google-search-is-just-trash... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27429722 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27429722 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27379228 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27379228 Heck there's even a website for this: https://sirchester.app/ https://sirchester.app/ > Because Google results have been spammy and useless lately. Adding "reddit" or "hacker news" often yields better results.
      - arbol 5y ago
        I reckon the parent is correct about reddit having poor search capabilities. I often search for terms with site:stackoverflow.com as searching within stackoverflow consistently asks me to fill in a captcha challenge or gives poor results.

endisneigh 5y ago

You’re missing the point - a popular sites own lack of internal search would explain the use of external search. The metric in the article does really define search results nor has it been used with other providers as well. I’d love to not use Bing/Google but no one has shown me something better.

foxfluff 5y ago
> You’re missing the point - a popular sites own lack of internal search would explain the use of external search. Sigh. The point is that 1) Google gives trash results by default 2) users know there are good results out there on the web, in particular on reddit 3) people append reddit to their google search query and suddenly good results start popping up 4) if google search wasn't trash by default, people would get good results without having to specifically direct the engine to reddit.
- endisneigh 5y ago
  People use Google to search Reddit because Reddit has terrible search. Nothing more than that. Your other assertions would need to be proved more rigorously. Not just for Google, but for any search engine. Don’t know what’s so difficult to understand about that lol.
  - foxfluff 5y ago
    > People use Google to search Reddit because Reddit has terrible search. Hey why don't you prove your assertion. > Your other assertions would need to be proved more rigorously. Not just for Google, but for any search engine. These are not my assertions. It's a claim the fine article is making. And they're not the only one making that claim. Anecdotally a lot of people are saying they do this to get useful results because Google results are trash. For example: https://www.resetera.com/threads/google-search-is-just-trash-now.125691/#post-22235872 https://www.resetera.com/threads/google-search-is-just-trash... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27429722 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27429722 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27379228 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27379228 Heck there's even a website for this: https://sirchester.app/ https://sirchester.app/ > Because Google results have been spammy and useless lately. Adding "reddit" or "hacker news" often yields better results.
    - arbol 5y ago
      I reckon the parent is correct about reddit having poor search capabilities. I often search for terms with site:stackoverflow.com as searching within stackoverflow consistently asks me to fill in a captcha challenge or gives poor results.