3 ms·

Maybe it's not related but, talking about search engines, I have been using only DuckDuckGo and I am very happy with the results. I never have to switch back.

eole666 3y ago
I tried duckduckgo for a while.. I don't know if it's because my main language is french, but I found the results really worse than google's and so I used the !g bang really often. I switched to startpage (proxy seargh engine giving google results), it was ok but a bit slow. Now I use Kagi search, you have to pay for it, but results are great (often better than google) : less SEO spam, a lot of tuning possible, custom searches, small web searches, good image and map searches. And it is supposed to respect your privacy and private data.
- PoignardAzur 3y ago
  For what it's worth, I'm French too, and DuckDuckGo works for me 95% of the time. It definitely has a different "flavor" of results though.
yummypaint 3y ago
Me too, now I find google outright unusable. The whole first page is ads! Adapting to DDG is a much smaller adjustment than using subject heading search and traditional library tools.
- spaceman_2020 3y ago
  The other day, I wanted to look up the Asian games medals tally for all the countries. Google kept showing me pages with only the medals tally for my country. Had to use DDG to find the right page.
ImPleadThe5th 3y ago
I just recently switched and am surprised how well it works. Ever so often it'll serve me up some completely unrelated stuff, but there's kind of a charm in that. "Oh the thing I am looking for is really not that popular, neat". Unlike google where it'll hit you with tons of seemingly related results.
zo1 3y ago
Same here. Mostly only use google for localized results when I'm trying to find a specific product to buy locally. Or if I have to find something specific and need to use the "site:" syntax, which they haven't yet removed. 5/10/20 years from now, all that will be left of Google search is the map/product/store portions, if we even have an internet at all at that point.
acheron 3y ago
I have been using DDG as my normal search for over 10 years at this point. For most of that time I had no problem with its search results and never had any reason to use Google. Unfortunately just like I read people saying Google search has gotten worse recently, I think DDG has gotten quite a bit worse recently too. So I don't know anymore.
- rurp 3y ago
  I've had a similar experience. DDG won me over years ago with the killer feature of searching for the terms I entered. In recent years they have been following the same path as Google and ignoring/replacing search terms more and more, even if they are quoted. Google is an absolute dumpster fire these days though, so I'm sticking with DDG for now. It's such a shame that there isn't a single good search engine left in the world.
- edpichler 3y ago
  I noticed that too. Before it was much more diverse and interesting. I believe it started to get worse after they started to integrate some results coming from Bing.
n_ary 3y ago
Been using DDG since the early release, but recently results started to get strange. A lot of relevant results are suddenly on bottom or second page while the top ones are usually content farms. I am not sure what kind of algorithm they use but rot is already visible. Unfortunately though, bing results had suddenly improved a lot recently, which is surprising as I presumed the DDG also uses content from Bing, but they also now serve their own content. I briefly also tried Qwant and the results are fairly ok ish.. The other Ecosia seems to have decided to spoil the interface design entirely and injects strange ads like the early days of google rot, so didn’t try it much. Alternatively, I am finding Brave search more tolerable with results being relevant and less content farmy. I tried Kagi a bit and results are pretty nice but it seems to degrade a bit when I search for non-technical stuff there. But they just started and given their duration in service their results are pretty awesome. P.S. Not affiliated with any of these search engines, just sharing my experience.

eole666 3y ago

I tried duckduckgo for a while.. I don't know if it's because my main language is french, but I found the results really worse than google's and so I used the !g bang really often. I switched to startpage (proxy seargh engine giving google results), it was ok but a bit slow. Now I use Kagi search, you have to pay for it, but results are great (often better than google) : less SEO spam, a lot of tuning possible, custom searches, small web searches, good image and map searches. And it is supposed to respect your privacy and private data.

PoignardAzur 3y ago
For what it's worth, I'm French too, and DuckDuckGo works for me 95% of the time. It definitely has a different "flavor" of results though.

yummypaint 3y ago

Me too, now I find google outright unusable. The whole first page is ads! Adapting to DDG is a much smaller adjustment than using subject heading search and traditional library tools.

spaceman_2020 3y ago
The other day, I wanted to look up the Asian games medals tally for all the countries. Google kept showing me pages with only the medals tally for my country. Had to use DDG to find the right page.

ImPleadThe5th 3y ago

I just recently switched and am surprised how well it works. Ever so often it'll serve me up some completely unrelated stuff, but there's kind of a charm in that. "Oh the thing I am looking for is really not that popular, neat". Unlike google where it'll hit you with tons of seemingly related results.

zo1 3y ago

Same here. Mostly only use google for localized results when I'm trying to find a specific product to buy locally. Or if I have to find something specific and need to use the "site:" syntax, which they haven't yet removed. 5/10/20 years from now, all that will be left of Google search is the map/product/store portions, if we even have an internet at all at that point.

acheron 3y ago

I have been using DDG as my normal search for over 10 years at this point. For most of that time I had no problem with its search results and never had any reason to use Google. Unfortunately just like I read people saying Google search has gotten worse recently, I think DDG has gotten quite a bit worse recently too. So I don't know anymore.

rurp 3y ago
I've had a similar experience. DDG won me over years ago with the killer feature of searching for the terms I entered. In recent years they have been following the same path as Google and ignoring/replacing search terms more and more, even if they are quoted. Google is an absolute dumpster fire these days though, so I'm sticking with DDG for now. It's such a shame that there isn't a single good search engine left in the world.
edpichler 3y ago
I noticed that too. Before it was much more diverse and interesting. I believe it started to get worse after they started to integrate some results coming from Bing.

n_ary 3y ago

Been using DDG since the early release, but recently results started to get strange. A lot of relevant results are suddenly on bottom or second page while the top ones are usually content farms. I am not sure what kind of algorithm they use but rot is already visible. Unfortunately though, bing results had suddenly improved a lot recently, which is surprising as I presumed the DDG also uses content from Bing, but they also now serve their own content. I briefly also tried Qwant and the results are fairly ok ish.. The other Ecosia seems to have decided to spoil the interface design entirely and injects strange ads like the early days of google rot, so didn’t try it much. Alternatively, I am finding Brave search more tolerable with results being relevant and less content farmy. I tried Kagi a bit and results are pretty nice but it seems to degrade a bit when I search for non-technical stuff there. But they just started and given their duration in service their results are pretty awesome. P.S. Not affiliated with any of these search engines, just sharing my experience.