Very true, but the second part, mostly irrelevant results is a matter of degree. #Google's results were once fantastic, but these days, a big chunk of the first five pages of a search are irrelevant results, often SEO'd into high positions and knocking relevant results lower.
#Bing (and #Yahoo, #DDG, and others who use Bing's results) are also described with increasing accuracy by "mostly irrelevant results".
But yes, YaCy's results are even worse. I want to set up another YaCy instance, just to crawl sites of interest in various topics. I know there's a major software change needed to get the most improvement in search results, but having the right information in the global index is a necessary precursor to producing good results.
I do disagree with this, in that #Bing's search results aren't just bad because they can only crawl 90% of the sites that #Google can. Bing's results are bad because their ranking algorithms fail to put the information people are searching for at the top of the results. If one clicks through 9 or 10 pages of results, one might find something relevant, which was probably why #Yahoo and #DDG used to deliver better results than Bing, while sourcing most or all of their results from Bing.
@musicman They don't seem to be running Duckbot anymore, just grabbing results straight from #Bing. And Bing's results were almost as bad as Ask's, last time I checked.
So, yeah, I don't know how #DDG (and to some extent #Yahoo) were able to do it before, but their results were far better than Bing's despite mostly coming from Bing. Now, they're pretty similar ... and overall bad.
I still go to #DuckDuckGo first, but more and more, I find myself going to #Startpage or directly to #Google after a failed DDG search.
New (in 2020) ranking factors used by #Bing. They mostly look good, so one would expect their results to become more relevant to the search over time. Unfortunately, Bing’s results are not improving. In fact, both #Yahoo and #DuckDuckGo search engines, which use Bing as a source, are declining rapidly.
Where Yahoo’s results were formerly almost as good as Google’s, and DDG’s were even better than “the G”, both now give almost identical results as Bing.
No idea about their filters, but I consider #Bing a failure at search. Their results are barely better than #Ask.com these days. Both #Yahoo and #DDG use their backend, but somehow have better results (but both are in steep decline).
I do admit that it may vary based on the topics one searches for, but I've been trying out #Google alternatives for years, but no matter which I use, I eventually have to use Google (even if indirectly, such as via #StartPage or #Searx).
LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864} (lnxw48a1@nu.federati.net)'s status on Monday, 03-Feb-2020 17:19:13 UTC
LinuxWalt (@lnxw48a1) {3EB165E0-5BB1-45D2-9E7D-93B31821F864}#Yahoo (now combined with #AOL to form #Oath, a subsidiary of #Verizon) proposes to buy $117.5 million dollars worth of credit monitoring as compensation for people whose information was leaked between 2012 and 2016.
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Credit monitoring is almost useless (because alerts happen after the fact; there are more effective services that basically turn off all credit inquiries, preventing the use of stolen info), and it also lasts for a limited time. If a badguy has your basic info and secret question info (third grade teacher's name, first pet's name, model of first car, mother's maiden name, etc) they can wait a couple of years and _then_ open accounts in your name.
@blort @johnnynull I noticed years ago that #DDG’s results differ from #Yahoo’s, which differ from #Bing’s. Non-bubbling may be part of it, but it doesn’t explain the sharply different results (or at least sort order of the results) between the Bing and Yahoo.
It doesn’t surprise me that #Startpage’s results differ from #Google’s, even beyond the filter bubble.
As for which to use, I use a variety, including Startpage, but the main one is determined mainly by quality of results, and Startpage’s results are generally inferior to #DuckDuckGo and to #Searx & #Seeks (but far superior to #YaCy or the abysmal results that #Ask gives).
Ultimately it seems (correct me if I'm wrong) that you're saying you get better results from #DuckDuckGo's combining of results from #Bing, #Yahoo, #WolframAlpha etc. with their own index, than from the results #Google returns to #Startpage, right?
Great.
Meanwhile I'm saying I'd rather have search algorithms and indexes that are transparent and not controlled by for profit companies that often have a conflict of interest.
Thanks, if you do come across that, I'd be very interested to read it!
It's unclear from that link though, whether there's anything going on beyond that they're getting different results by removing #Google's "personalization" (aka filter bubble).
If there is, it reinforces the point that we need to get away from black box, proprietary, for profit search algo's/indexes. Eg. who's to say #Bing and #Yahoo aren't doing similar things with results going to #DuckDuckGo?
Quite possibly. It misses the point though. For just search result quality, just use #Startpage, with Google's index. If you don't want a profit minded company deciding what everyone gets to (not) see though- don't use their index. #Qwant has their own and they're non-profit. #DuckDuckGo uses a mix including #Bing, #Yahoo with their own. More biased than Qwant, worse results than Startpage. Personally I use Qwant for 95% and Startpage where I don't find the result I need.
"Founded in 2007, Tumblr reached its heyday around 2012, and hosted 108 million blogs the following year, when it was acquired by Yahoo. It wilted under the company’s leadership and is broadly acknowledged to be on the decline." https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/06/style/tumblr-porn.html
There seems to be a pattern here, like #Yahoo is a digital retirement home where aging websites go to die (have they acquired #MySpace yet?). Maybe Tumblr needs to escape, just like #FlickR did?
#Yahoo, jetzt reichts. Ich entscheide ganz allein, welche App ich zum Mailabruf verwende, egal ob ihr sie als veraltet betrachtet oder nicht. Ungefragt alle 2 Wochen den Zugriff zu deaktivieren trägt nicht unbedingt zur Freude eurer Kunden bei. Wird Zeit, dass ich die wichtigsten Dienste endlich mal zu mailbox.org umleite.
@moonman @rw @se7en@freezepeach.xzy Compare, for example, the continuing saga of #OPM breaches with any other breaches anywhere. Ignoring #Yahoo!, no other breach comes close in the scope of data that was lost.
When you remember that this data collection was mandatory (that is, if someone applied for a federal job during the right time period, certain data about them and their neighbors, friends, relatives was required to be collected by contracted investigators), we cannot even imagine the information that would be mandatorily collected and repeatedly exposed in breaches.
@kat @bob I'm sure #Google's original main purpose was to prevent local ISPs from hijacking #DNS requests and sending them through a #Yahoo based search page for revenue enhancement. (both #ATT and #Verizon are really bad about this).