Technology

59656 readers

2719 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

Follow the lemmy.world rules.
Only tech related content.
Be excellent to each another!
Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
Politics threads may be removed.
No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

612

Is it just me or do all search engines feel soooo bad these days? (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by MTK@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

239 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I suspect that this is the direct result of AI generated content just overwhelming any real content.

I tried ddg, google, bing, quant, and none of them really help me find information I want these days.

Perplexity seems to work but I don't like the idea of AI giving me "facts" since they are mostly based on other AI posts

ETA: someone suggested SearXNG and after using it a bit it seems to be much better compared to ddg and the rest.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] ArdMacha@lemmy.world 14 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Kagi isn't free

[–] capital@lemmy.world 22 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

The search problem is largely due to not being the actual customer.

Look at me. I’m the customer now.

[–] daniskarma@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

If I use ublock or whoogle I may not be customer. But the customer wont get anything from me anyway.

[–] asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

And you won't get good search results in exchange.

[–] daniskarma@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Same results as any other metasearch engine, like kagi.

[–] Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 month ago

Neither is beer

[–] hannesh93@feddit.org 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

If it's free then you're the product

And if you're the product then there's an interest to keep you on the site and show you ads which works best if the first result isn't the correct one and you need to scroll or even go to page two

It's literally the reason why Google got so much worse that they wanted to show more ads to users which wouldn't work if the best result is always the first

[–] ikidd@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago (2 children)

If you think paying means you aren't still the product, I have news for you.

I don't need my search history tied directly to a means of payment, and not because I search for illicit stuff, but because I don't need an advertising profile built on me that is absolutely tied to me now, because I paid for it.

If Kagi doesn't turn out to be selling that info in a year or two, I'll eat a bug.

[–] babybus@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Exactly. A paid search engine is a privacy nightmare, and you have zero guarantees that they don't monetize you one way or another in addition to the subscription fee.

[–] Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 month ago

You want to compare the hard evidence on abuse between paid search engines and unpaid search engines? I'm happy to work through that data with you.

[–] Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 month ago

I pay anonymously through crypto accounts. It's easy and I can open new Kagi accounts if I want. I'm saving a beetle for you.

[–] daniskarma@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 month ago

I'm a shitty product because I block any ad that tries to display on my browser.