
Safari to Include DuckDuckGo as a Built-In Search Option - antr
http://daringfireball.net/linked/2014/06/02/duckduckgo
======
mmahemoff
I thought something might be up when I saw Gabriel's unassuming tweet.

[https://twitter.com/yegg/status/473545653667102721](https://twitter.com/yegg/status/473545653667102721)

Personally I'm hoping DDG will at some point pick up the slack from Google
dropping the Discussions tab (forum search). Evidently it wasn't so popular,
but I found it hugely useful for researching product decisions and haven't
found a good alternative. Seems like it could be a good niche to cover.

~~~
silverbax88
Agreed on this. I think the quality of Google searches has gone down
dramatically for this type of search, because forum posts are often where
people have questions answered. It's not just product research; programming,
homework questions, general subject matter, all are often answered best in
forum posts.

~~~
mmahemoff
Could be. I'm not really sure if the quality of search went down, it seems to
be a lot better imo after Panda+Penguin purged a lot of ridiculously spammy
pages; but I still want a way to just search discussions.

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arrrg
Nice, but they should open up everything more and let people install any
search engine. Apple did open up quite a bit today (in terms of letting others
access their platform in places where Apple previously was the sole decider),
so it’s not unlikely to eventually happen.

~~~
hcarvalhoalves
You can set the search provider on current Safari, so I'm guessing there'll be
a way to install a system-wide search provider.

That would be very handy and I can see Spotlight being a lot more powerful if
that's possible (integrating with specialized fact DBs, SaaS, etc.).

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ChrisLTD
Awesome. I've been using a router hack* to accomplish this on iOS, but it'll
be nice to have DuckDuckGo when I'm not on my home network.

* [http://chrisltd.com/blog/2013/04/duck-duck-go-iphone-ipad/](http://chrisltd.com/blog/2013/04/duck-duck-go-iphone-ipad/)

~~~
JohnTHaller
Wait, iOS won't let you customize your search engine beyond the 3 presets?!?
Just... wow.

~~~
burkaman
Android doesn't either, it gives you the same three presets.

~~~
admax88q
Of course on Android you can always just install any app you want, such as
firefox, and rock and roll.

Fuck Apple deciding what I can and can not run on my phone.

~~~
giovannibajo1
FWIW you can install alternative browsers with alternative search engines in
iOS as well. I regularly use a Tor browser, for instance. The only thing
that's fixed is the Webkit engine, but that's immaterial to this discussion.

~~~
JohnTHaller
It's not quite immaterial. You can only use an alternate search engine on iOS
if you install a _slower_ browser due to Apple withholding the JIT
capabilities of Mobile Safari from 3rd parties, thus artificially propping up
Mobile Safari as the fastest iOS browser. Although Chrome on Android limits
you to only the 3 bundled search engines, alternative browsers expose
additional choices without being artificially limited by Google.

~~~
giovannibajo1
FWIW, this will be history starting with iOS8:
[http://9to5mac.com/2014/06/03/ios-8-webkit-changes-
finally-a...](http://9to5mac.com/2014/06/03/ios-8-webkit-changes-finally-
allow-all-apps-to-have-the-same-performance-as-safari/)

Now the web view runs in a separate process with a separate sandbox, so it can
run the same JIT of Safari without security concerns (mainly, writable memory
with execution permissions).

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Brakenshire
Be interesting to see whether it has any effect on the numbers:

[https://duckduckgo.com/traffic.html](https://duckduckgo.com/traffic.html)

~~~
stardotstar
Wow! Look at the surge in the traffic after "Surveillance revelations". Future
look very optimistic for DDG.

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dredmorbius
This makes perfect sense in light of the growing relationship status of Apple
and Google as major competitors in devices space (Android and iOS), and as
such, it's a brilliant strategic move on Apple's part. DDG have made the first
real inroads in search in over a decade, and they've done so quietly.

I can think of a number of widely touted alternatives which utterly failed to
do so: Cuil, Bing, Blekko, A9, Teoma, and more (a DDG search shows a bunch of
skeletons:
[https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22new+search+engine%22+challenge+...](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22new+search+engine%22+challenge+google)).
None has had the traction DDG seems to have garnered.

I see a confluence of a number of things:

• Snowden. People are now privacy conscious, and aware of the tremendous
amount of information disclosed in Web searches. DDG's huge traffic spike
following the Snowden disclosures is testimony to this:
[https://duckduckgo.com/traffic.html](https://duckduckgo.com/traffic.html)

• Google is the one to beat. Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Rackspace,
and others see Google as their primary competition. This creates an alignment
of interests among them.

• Google has shown vulnerabilities. Failures to execute on a string of social
efforts, most recently G+, as well as an increasing sense of distraction, as
well as possible signs of weakness in its core search business, suggest a
vulnerable underside to Google. DDG isn't big enough to cause real damage yet,
but it can certainly get Google's attention.

• Democratization of search. Was a time when massive datacenter investments
were necessary for search. That's both no longer the case, _and_ DC
infrastructure's getting cheaper, both of which cut away at Google's core
competency and advantage.

• Google's lost its favored status among the technorati. While it's not clear
who's won that crown, there's an increasing strong sense among many that
Google have failed at their "don't be evil" pledge, have disappointed users,
and simply don't have the chops they once demonstrated.

• Specialized search is making inroads. OpenStreetMap is taking on geosearch,
Wolfram+Alpha and Knoema specialized data search, Wikipedia is a basic more-
or-less-trusted repository of actual _information_ (as opposed to random Web
sites), Amazon is a product and bibliographic research library. There are
places to go for information which, if you've got a _specific_ interest, are
better than Google, and they're carving off bits of the search market.

So, yes, for the first time in 15 years, search looks like it may be ripe for
a bit of disruption.

Don't get me wrong: Google does some things amazingly well. Date-bounded Web
searches still draw me back (I did some here to turn up a few of the more
obscure search contenders from the early 2000s), the Google Books Ngram viewer
is fucking awesome, Google Trends isn't bad, and a few other elements.
_Reliability_ of Google services is amazing. But there are chinks in the
armor.

~~~
jonathansizz
You mean that DDG offers the _illusion_ of privacy, right? It's more than a
little naive to think that the NSA won't be able to pull data without needing
the cooperation of DDG (and they're obviously not dissuaded from doing so by
any laws). We also don't know about any secret court orders that may or may
not have been issued to DDG compelling them to turn over data. And how are we
supposed to know that DDG haven't done a deal with Microsoft to pass on data
under threat of being closed down, or even that they follow their stated
privacy policy?

I'm not suggesting that any of these scenarios have necessarily taken place,
but we'd have no way of knowing if they have. Also, the more popular DDG
becomes, the more tempting a target it becomes to the NSA et al.

So by all means use DDG if you like its other features, but try to be
realistic about privacy.

~~~
jeorgun
Pretty much their entire pitch is that they don't _store_ the data[1]. I don't
really see how they can be forced to give up data they don't have.

[1] [https://duckduckgo.com/privacy#s3](https://duckduckgo.com/privacy#s3)

~~~
VMG
I don't see how you can be certain that they don't store the data if
government can easily force them to and make them shut up about it.

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moyaRD
For months i have been in transition to DuckDuckGo. The only missing bit was
native search in safari for iOS and OSX. This definitely seal the deal. And is
good for all the industry that a viable second choice exist to bring balance
to the force , and bring humility to google monopoly in search.

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k-mcgrady
Just set it as my default on iOS and searched for osx 10.10 Top part of the
screen shows a Wikipedia result and the remainder shows an ad. Switching back
to google.

If they can make that mobile UI much better I'll make it my default but I've
essentially done a search and saw no results without having to scroll.

~~~
r00fus
I presume you're on iOS8 beta? Presumably when iOS8 goes gold in the fall, the
DDG landing page for mobile users will be greatly improved.

This is a great partnership, as both companies, unlike Google, seem to see
privacy as a major feature.

~~~
k-mcgrady
I don't see why their mobile page should be different when iOS 8 is reelased.
It's the same problem I have with their desktop site actually. The quick
answer box at the top of search results that thinks it knows what I want takes
up way too much space.

~~~
r00fus
Because a) they want to take the time to do it right and b) the floodgates for
new iOS users (the majority non-betas) will open then.

Don't expect a beta experience to be awesome when DDG has months to get it
right for the real release date.

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100rsa
One reason I still not use DDG is no support for language specific search
(settings not work). It mixed many similar language in the search result, for
example, english and spanish.

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stickhandle
I really really want to like ddg, but I can't seem to get away from a need to
!g. Further, though its obviously a loss in privacy, the quality in search
results returning from a "context aware" google is just leaps better. Its a
trade-off I guess. I know HN is very much in support of the primacy of privacy
... but there is no doubt search and ad relevancy goes down in anonymity.

~~~
bjterry
I've been using DDG for quite a while now, and I've noticed in the last few
weeks or months that their search results have gotten much better. Before I'd
have to use !g on most of my queries, but now it's much more of a rarity.

------
tomrod
How is duckduckgo's search quality nowadays?

~~~
mey
I've switched over to it for 90% of requests. The only thing I find really
fails are very precise technical questions.

Edit: Let me rephrase, it's my default search engine. If the result isn't
great, I may rerun it with !g which will then forward my request on to google.
Makes it really easy to migrated while still being able to fall back when
needed.

~~~
dredmorbius
For technical questions, my first go-to is generally StackExchange (!so) or a
site-specific search (w3.org is great for specific CSS spec queries which I
seem to have been doing a lot lately) via DDG bang syntax. Google's my third
choice.

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Holbein
From the article: "Private Browsing mode — which doesn’t save your browsing
history"

I wonder whether iCloud tabs still work in private browsing mode. In other
words, do Apple and others still get to see all your supposedly "private"
URLs?

~~~
gergles
No, they don't. This feature already exists, and private tabs don't go to
iCloud.

~~~
Holbein
Good to know, thanks!

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DigitalSea
This is fantastic news for DuckDuckGo and for Apple. A nice solid search
engine coupled with a nice new redesign. If I were Google I would be a little
bit worried DuckDuckGo are steadily stealing users. They converted me.

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jlarocco
Well, at least I like one thing Apple's doing.

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MiguelHudnandez
The enemy of your enemy is your friend, indeed!

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zmmmmm
Is Google still the default?

~~~
sudont
Yes, via a new install to an iPad.

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kome
So, yandex basically.

------
Holbein
Search engine placement is big business - doesn't Firefox make millions each
year with Google referrals?

Apple did not add ddg in the past few years despite people asking them to,
which might indicate that Apple, too, asks for money for these referrals.

So this begs the question - how how much did ddg have to pay?

~~~
sheetjs
> doesn't Firefox make millions each year with Google referrals?

Mozilla grossed 311M for FY2012, almost all of which came from their deal with
google: [https://static.mozilla.com/moco/en-
US/pdf/Mozilla_Audited_Fi...](https://static.mozilla.com/moco/en-
US/pdf/Mozilla_Audited_Financials_2012.pdf)

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pervycreeper
Meanwhile, 10.10 will track more keystrokes and gather more personal data than
ever. Doesn't have anything to do with privacy. More to do with being at war
with Google.

~~~
r00fus
Can you give me more specifics as to what's being captured?

~~~
kevinh
Typing in the search field on iOS 8 will fetch web results as well, which
means some web server is being hit with what you're typing. Spotlight on
Yosemite is getting a similar feature as well.

~~~
D4AHNGM
I'd suspect that at least on Yosemite you'll be able to disable the web
search. You can already choose to chop out huge sections of Spotlight's
optional functionality on Mavericks, so I don't see why that'd change come
Yosemite.

