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I actually think their name is one of the strongest things going for them...and Google being more than a search engine to be the very reason Bing is gaining mar

I actually think their name is one of the strongest things going for them...and Google being more than a search engine to be the very reason Bing is gaining market share and brands like DDG actually have a shot at competing. Regarding the name...it is unique and very MEMORABLE (repetition is one of the four mental glues.) It has just as few syllables as Microsoft, and is super easy to pronounce... From a branding perspective they are taking a very strong positioning play of being the Search Engine that respects privacy. Smart strategy if you ask me... to position themselves opposite the dominant brand with a hot button differentiation. Regarding the trust factor, and the being locked in to google, those are actually both weaknesses of Google. The locked in issue is part and parcel with the privacy issue, which is the market DDG is trying to penetrate. Regarding Trust, I don't see why I need to trust a search engine to use it. In fact, the privacy thing again is the very reason I DON'T Trust Google... People Use Google because Google focused on Search when all other search engines tried to be so much more. Once Google won the category (where people say, "Just Google It." They assumed they owned the market and started betting on the future convergence of search and social, etc... I actually think in 5 years from now, Google won't be the dominant player in search, although I do think Android will become a bigger money maker for them... DuckDuckGo is doing a fine job with their name and brand strategy...up until this article and complaint which undermines their focused strategy. By complaining about Google, they appear to be in the game of competing as an equal search engine, not a DIFFERENT search experience, which is the play they need to make to win. It's the reason Burger King can't take over McDonalds...because they just claim to be better, not different. Pepsi on the other hand claims to be for the New Generation, Different than Coke which is classic, and the real thing. Just like Listerine has the brand of being more powerful than scope because they used the slogan,"The Taste You Hate Twice a Day." They said we are different, not better. Human perception is near impossible to change... Complaining about monopolies is like saying, "we are better but they wont let us play." If DDG wants to win, they need to pound hard about how they are different, and if they insist on complaining about Google, it should be consistent with their brand strategy and focus on how Google is more than search, and DDG is for when you just want to find what you are looking for with true privacy.

Surio 14y ago
Agree with everything you say, except ". By complaining about Google, they appear to be in the game of competing as an equal search engine," The nature of his exact complaint is that Google is capitalising on people's confusion with the name "Duck something", and then proceeding to capitalise on this confusion (in a somewhat sneaky way) by redirecting "potential DDG users" back to their own page. >> they need to pound hard about how they are different And this point is very difficult to achieve if the "market leader" is (sort of) preventing people from accessing you in the first place.
- davemel37 14y ago
  Whether Google did this or not is hardly the point. The point is that DDG can never win if they lump themselves into the same category as Google. The confusion they complain about, and monopoly is DDG claiming we are the same as Google. This is the not the play that will win them the west.
  - Surio 14y ago
    Hi, First, I agree that they should not lump themselves in the same category. Second, I am not sure there is any point in crying yourself hoarse about how "different" you are when the general public who are looking for you using natural language constructs are not being allowed to access you in the first place by the "market leader". Going forward this that line of thought, I am reproducing my reply from below to your point, as it seems relevant here as well. (Apologies for the multiple posting). If you read @yegge's original response from below (I reproduced it here) This only started happening after I asked about the domain name. It used to point to a history page about Duck Corporation (previous name of On2 -- http://web.archive.org/web/20100802014055/http://duck.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20100802014055/http://duck.com/), similar to http://www.on2.com/ http://www.on2.com/, which was acquired by Google in the same acquisition. Google should legitimately not sell it to me, though it would have been of course nice to do so when I first asked in 2010. I think an appropriate remedy would be to either point it nowhere, point it to the original page it had been pointed to for many years, or point it to the acquisition page (as http://on2.com http://on2.com still does) -- all things they do in other cases if you look at past acquisitions. Effectively it is Google's fault because they are doing it now specifically in his case and not for others (as he mentions clearly) (because from their own tracking of searches, they probably found out that DDG is gaining significant traction -- this is my own opinion) Secondly, while it would be nice to pre-empt all angles and all possibilities etc., etc., but I don't think any of us can foresee every possible way something will come back to bite your backside in the future. So, no, I don't think that it is somehow DDG's fault that they did not foresee this and preempt it. P.S: FWIW, google renamed themselves from googol to google because the VC mispelled their name on the cheque. Just goes to show that such things are a fact of life. People have every right to vaguely try to look up "Duck something" search engine. However, Google is definitely in the wrong for sneakily redirecting users back to their own engine in this case by misusing this vagueness.

Surio 14y ago

Agree with everything you say, except ". By complaining about Google, they appear to be in the game of competing as an equal search engine," The nature of his exact complaint is that Google is capitalising on people's confusion with the name "Duck something", and then proceeding to capitalise on this confusion (in a somewhat sneaky way) by redirecting "potential DDG users" back to their own page. >> they need to pound hard about how they are different And this point is very difficult to achieve if the "market leader" is (sort of) preventing people from accessing you in the first place.

davemel37 14y ago
Whether Google did this or not is hardly the point. The point is that DDG can never win if they lump themselves into the same category as Google. The confusion they complain about, and monopoly is DDG claiming we are the same as Google. This is the not the play that will win them the west.
- Surio 14y ago
  Hi, First, I agree that they should not lump themselves in the same category. Second, I am not sure there is any point in crying yourself hoarse about how "different" you are when the general public who are looking for you using natural language constructs are not being allowed to access you in the first place by the "market leader". Going forward this that line of thought, I am reproducing my reply from below to your point, as it seems relevant here as well. (Apologies for the multiple posting). If you read @yegge's original response from below (I reproduced it here) This only started happening after I asked about the domain name. It used to point to a history page about Duck Corporation (previous name of On2 -- http://web.archive.org/web/20100802014055/http://duck.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20100802014055/http://duck.com/), similar to http://www.on2.com/ http://www.on2.com/, which was acquired by Google in the same acquisition. Google should legitimately not sell it to me, though it would have been of course nice to do so when I first asked in 2010. I think an appropriate remedy would be to either point it nowhere, point it to the original page it had been pointed to for many years, or point it to the acquisition page (as http://on2.com http://on2.com still does) -- all things they do in other cases if you look at past acquisitions. Effectively it is Google's fault because they are doing it now specifically in his case and not for others (as he mentions clearly) (because from their own tracking of searches, they probably found out that DDG is gaining significant traction -- this is my own opinion) Secondly, while it would be nice to pre-empt all angles and all possibilities etc., etc., but I don't think any of us can foresee every possible way something will come back to bite your backside in the future. So, no, I don't think that it is somehow DDG's fault that they did not foresee this and preempt it. P.S: FWIW, google renamed themselves from googol to google because the VC mispelled their name on the cheque. Just goes to show that such things are a fact of life. People have every right to vaguely try to look up "Duck something" search engine. However, Google is definitely in the wrong for sneakily redirecting users back to their own engine in this case by misusing this vagueness.