Re:How to live without Google (2017)
by hrktb on Monday March 18, 2019 @10:31AM
(#19421314)
I know it's partly snark, but I think Google is not actually that good at it. Not because they are complacent, but because search is a hard problem and there is no objectively 'good' results to any arbitrary query.
There is a tradeoff for any given user between getting the most popular results and what could be the most 'accurate' result. I find myself using several search engines depending on what I want (apart from Google/DDG, you always have the option to go directly to amazon or StackOverflow for instance), and am pretty happy about it.
But saying Google is good at search is a bit like praising Wallmart for being good at retail. Sure, they are to some extent, but there are clear tradeoffs we need to be aware of.
There is a tradeoff for any given user between getting the most popular results and what could be the most 'accurate' result. I find myself using several search engines depending on what I want (apart from Google/DDG, you always have the option to go directly to amazon or StackOverflow for instance), and am pretty happy about it.
But saying Google is good at search is a bit like praising Wallmart for being good at retail. Sure, they are to some extent, but there are clear tradeoffs we need to be aware of.