Google search discussion

[gabrgv]

(This is getting a bit off-topic.)

Google Search is easily rivalled by plenty of other search engines these days.

From my experience, there is no search engine that rivals Google search where results outside of US (and Europe, I guess) are concerned.

So we are left with engines that serve Google’s index. Let’s see:

• Kagi
  Paid/registration required.
• Ask, DogPile, Gibiru
  Can’t set the location or region of the results.
• Presearch
  Slow and visually bloated: no improvement over Google; and has that stupid pepper icon thing (yes, it matters to me). But passable for third world countries results.
• Startpage, SearXNG
  Actually better than Google overall, just the UI and/or colors would require some debloating/improving for them to be usable. But passable for third world countries results.

But, the problem is that only Google and DuckDuckGo somehow force safe search through DNS, and this is a deal-breaker for me. A preference, like in Startpage and Searx wouldn’t help, because you can turn it off. Also, Google has a better and cleaner UI than Startpage (I’m referring to the Web only/no AI Google, the &udm=14). And that “anonymous view” thing of Startpage would need to go (an user style is enough).

I remember there was a Google front-end called Whoogle that I used to run locally on my machine. It was very light, but I don’t know if it still works.

Off-topic:

Yep

The site doesn’t even work in Basilisk.

[frostknight]

, there is no search engine that rivals Google search where results outside of US (and Europe, I guess) are concerned.

False completely especially given their ads a plenty

Actually better than Google overall, just the UI and/or colors would require some debloating/improving for them to be usable. But passable for third world countries results.

I beg to differ. Google is obsessed with their eye candy approach rather than substance. They don't focus on making the service good underneath but they make it very eye candy friendly... like wtf

[Moonchild]

there is no search engine that rivals Google search

So, you do a Google search. what do you get?
First, an AI "summary" answer that is probably inaccurate, and at the very least harming the website's traffic where the information was scraped from.
Then, a good number of "sponsored results" (i.e. ads) that probably don't give you a good result because they are there to rope you into buying something.
Then whatever their algorithm decides is best for your demographic, region, etc.
and only then do you get into the realm of search results actually focusing on what you searched for as primary parameters.

I guess no search engine rivals them in amount of fluff it gets polluted with. But not otherwise XD

[gabrgv]

False completely especially given their ads a plenty

Well, it’s true for the country I live in, and I no see no ads.

Google is obsessed with their eye candy approach rather than substance. They don't focus on making the service good underneath but they make it very eye candy friendly... like wtf

I know, but see for yourself:

1758227199.png

1758227213.png

(It gets worse in the parts I left out.)

[Lucio Chiappetti]

(This is getting a bit off-topic.)
From my experience, there is no search engine that rivals Google search where results outside of US (and Europe, I guess) are concerned.

Off-topic:
Off topic for off topic, I really can't stand what Google (search) has become, with lot of unwanted ads or alike (it is true that even DDG sometimes return unwanted/irrelevant commerce-oriented results for some search key which can be confused with some goods/ware/time for sale ... but my usual searches are not oriented to something I might buy ... usually history, geography, biology, science ... may be that's why I often get "calling improving.duckduckgo.com" ).
I sometimes use Google maps (though I prefer Openstreetmap both for the topographic look and for the lack of list of shops, restaurants, hotels etc. put in excessive evidence like GM does, also OSM is unbeatable for walking routes and footpaths). The address search in GM is sometimes better (bigger database, though with errors). Also GM has street view (which is useful to know the look of a place one has never been) and for my city has public transport timetables (which paradoxically the local transport agency does not provide satisfactorily on its site).

Ah, yes I use &udm=14 (and uBO too)

[gabrgv]

So, you do a Google search. what do you get?
First, an AI "summary" answer
Then, a good number of "sponsored results" (i.e. ads)
Then whatever their algorithm decides is best for your demographic, region, etc.
and only then do you get into the realm of search results actually focusing on what you searched for as primary parameters.

The first two I never get, because I use an ad-blocker and

the Web only/no AI Google, the &udm=14

The last two are generally the same when I’m searching for something to which the country I live in is relevant.

I rarely use Google search, though. I have been using DDG for a long time now.

[Moonchild]

Split this off for clarity.

[LuftWafflePilot]

I get the AI bullshit with Duck as well.
Also Duck doesn't give me nearly as many results as Google. I often don't find what I'm looking for at Duck, but when I do a Google search, it's there.
I still use Duck because Google fucking sucks in PM and over time makes it crawl, but I often switch back because I just don't get the same results.

[Gemmaugr]

Yep

The site doesn’t even work in Basilisk.

It will in the next update, probably. Because of https://repo.palemoon.org/MoonchildProd ... ssues/2714

Also, have you tried Brave search? It uses Cliqz Tailcat search engine & index as a base, which was modeled to function like good old google, back when they weren't evil (or at least they said so themselves).

Mojeek is an up and coming search engine that seems to constantly improve upon itself.

Otherwise, many Bing frontends are very country specific, like Metaget from Germany, SwissCows from Switzerland, Oscobo from the UK, and Qwant & Lilo from France.

Of course, there are 2 other independent search engines, which I hesitate to point out, but there's also Russian Yandex and Chinese Baidu..

[gabrgv]

Also, have you tried Brave search?

I didn’t use it long enough to say if the results are better than Google’s, but the UI is actually worse than Starpage’s (looks way “Googler” than &udm=14 Google); besides, there isn’t an option to save the preferences as a URL to bookmark, like in DuckDuckGo, Mojeek, Startpage, SearXNG, etc. And it has the same problem related to safe search I mentioned before.

Mojeek is an up and coming search engine that seems to constantly improve upon itself.

I often try to make Mojeek my main search engine, but, you know…
As for the Bing-based and the others, I think DDG will serve me better.

[Mæstro]

I get the AI — with Duck as well.

DuckDuckGo offers its ‘no AI’ subdomain, which is true to its name in excluding machine-generated summaries, image results etc.

[BenFenner]

DuckDuckGo offers its ‘no AI’ subdomain, which is true to its name in excluding machine-generated summaries, image results etc.

How do we get this version available for the search bar in Pale Moon?

[Moonchild]

How do we get this version available for the search bar in Pale Moon?

I've created a searchplugin for it and added it to the addons site.
https://addons.palemoon.org/search-plugins/

[BenFenner]

<3

[Mæstro]

My internet wanderings today led me to learn that Google is prototyping LLM as a complete substitute for search results. While holidaying in the States, I have noticed aggressive adverts by Google promoting widespread LLM use, going so far as to partner with telephone vendors to give away ‘free’ mobile phones with Gemini. It is too easy to fantasise about where these trends might lead.

[Moonchild]

My internet wanderings today led me to learn that Google is prototyping LLM as a complete substitute for search results.

If they do that, we can forget about accurate answers from Google search. I'm really surprised they want to exchange indexed results for inaccurate LLM results. LLMs are not replacements for databases.

[Gemmaugr]

My internet wanderings today led me to learn that Google is prototyping LLM as a complete substitute for search results.

If they do that, we can forget about accurate answers from Google search. I'm really surprised they want to exchange indexed results for inaccurate LLM results. LLMs are not replacements for databases.

Not only that, but I can see a time coming when google just lets their AI write their programs as well. It'll end up with no one in the corporation having a single clue on how the underlying code works. Maybe it's far-fetched, but honestly, I wouldn't be surprised.

[Mæstro]

If they do that, we can forget about accurate answers from Google search. I'm really surprised they want to exchange indexed results for inaccurate LLM results. LLMs are not replacements for databases.

Academic research is used to paying for database access, and I suppose the situation is similar for business. After seeing so many kindred cases of platform decay, I would not at all be surprised if Google should someday require subscriptions to access traditional search results.

Not only that, but I can see a time coming when google just lets their AI write their programs as well. It'll end up with no one in the corporation having a single clue on how the underlying code works. Maybe it's far-fetched, but honestly, I wouldn't be surprised.

An ex-friend who parted ways with me late last year, but who had been studying programming as an undergrad when I knew him, told me that he had instructors outright assigning his class to let a stochastic parrot write scripts for various purposes and edit them until they worked. It evokes the following:

When Europeans first arrived in China, three hundred years ago, they found that almost all the arts had reached a certain degree of perfection there; and they were surprised that a people which had attained this point should not have gone beyond it. At a later period they discovered some traces of the higher branches of science which were lost. The nation was absorbed in productive industry: the greater part of its scientific processes had been preserved, but science itself no longer existed there. This served to explain the strangely motionless state in which they found the minds of this people. The Chinese, in following the track of their forefathers, had forgotten the reasons by which the latter had been guided. They still used the formula, without asking for its meaning: they retained the instrument, but they no longer possessed the art of altering or renewing it. The Chinese, then, had lost the power of change; for them to improve was impossible. They were compelled, at all times and in all points, to imitate their predecessors, lest they should stray into utter darkness, by deviating for an instant from the path already laid down for them. The source of human knowledge was all but dry; and though the stream still ran on, it could neither swell its waters nor alter its channel.

[gabrgv]

[Brave doesn’t has] an option to save the preferences as an URL to bookmark, like in DuckDuckGo, Mojeek, Startpage, SearXNG, etc.

It does, sort of. Still, it’s very limited (Brave Search’s settings are), but it’s better than nothing.

[BloxDeGroteUnsklled]

Also, Google has a better and cleaner UI than Startpage (I’m referring to the Web only/no AI Google, the &udm=14). And that “anonymous view” thing of Startpage would need to go (an user style is enough).

I found Startpage to be cleaner no matter what.