Search engines are like older versions of LLMs. They are not designed as human-like assistants, but their goal of providing answers is similar in nature. Searc

Search engines are like older versions of LLMs. They are not designed as human-like assistants, but their goal of providing answers is similar in nature. Search engines tend to over summarize less, and provide lots of references. Something LLM researchers worked hard to achieve. If they feel lackluster for you, maybe you are not interested in those specific use cases in which they shine. Similarly, the reason could be that you don't want to check references for yourself, and you prefer to trust the selection of cross references provided by your LLM of choice. It is likely that your close circle of friends share an identity similar to yours. That is, by many, considered a defining characteristic of friendship. Although it can be a sign of the rising popularity of LLMs, one must take it as an anecdote and not a statistically significant fact. I do prefer a soft selection of queries on different search engines and different LLM models. Since you asked for an opinion and self-declared an ability to do searches and questions yourself, I don't feel obligated to cite sources for this answer.