
Let me Duck Duck Go that for you - arst
http://lmddgtfy.com
======
antirez
Using DDG as a replacement for Google in the latest two months. I'm impressed.
If it's better or not than google for certain types of usage, I'll let other
users to decide (but it _is_ better, for my usage). But what is truly
impressive is how this guy build a search engine that works in a way that is
comparable to Google for the end user, with limited resources.

~~~
Volt
I find that Google gives me better results when it matters. So although DDG
has been my primary search engine, there are times when I'll enter my query
into Google and get something that better satisfies my information need as
either the first or second result, whereas I might have to look further down
the list on DDG.

 _That said_ , I do love DDG, and it's still my primary search engine after 2
months as well. I switched based on the privacy policy (no personally
identifiable information retained), ability to use HTTPS, and the nice
infinite scrolling implementation, and unless these things change I'll
certainly continue to use it. The combination of these, plus the generally
impressive quality of the search results, make it really great.

Kinda solidifies the notion that you can compete on more than just the content
of the search results list.

~~~
Sirupsen
It's easy to double check on Google with DDG, if you search for: !google
hacker news

It'll take you to Google's results on Hacker News.

~~~
epi0Bauqu
It's even easier now. You can use the !g shortcut, and there are shortcuts for
most google services, e.g. !gf !gn etc.

------
epi0Bauqu
Stuff like this keeps me super-motivated. Thx Mike for making it!

~~~
lappie
I think ddg is a great initiative and like how you are going about it. I have
been following ddg quite a bit and also on the reddit ads/postings. With a
slightly long term view and clear focus I think it has a decent chance to
compete with the big guys.

Having said that, there are two things I noticed which I don't completely
agree with.

1\. The interface - the fonts, layout on the first page somehow is very
unreadable. I am not sure what the motivation behind this is, but imho even a
copy of hte exact google serp fonts/layout should have been good enough. The
only way ddg will stand out from Google is the quality of data on your serp.
There is very little incremental innovation possible from the layout that
Google already has for listing a list of links and text, and it also doesnt
seem to be your focus anyways.

2\. I think the auto extension of search results is a bad interface choice. A
pagination interface provides a clear anchoring and also for most people the
first 10 results are more than enough - anything more and the information
becomes too overwhelming. Again I dont think this provides any more value from
the Google interface and is bad from a cognitive overload viewpoint.

Just my two cents. Best of luck on ddg.

~~~
epi0Bauqu
Thx for the detailed constructive criticism. On 1, I disagree with the premise
that you can't improve UI. It's a subjective thing but I strongly believe a
non-negligible % of people would prefer a different UI.

That being said, wrt to fonts and sizes, I wonder if you like any arrangement
after tweaking the settings? <http://duckduckgo.com/settings.html>

On 2, I get way more positive feedback on this than negative, perhaps 10/1,
though I do agree there are issues around the edges.

~~~
axod
I know I've said this before, but the infinite scroll always catches me out.

I often brush on the trackpad to get to the bottom of the page. If there isn't
a bottom of the page, it just freaks me out. It makes me think something's
broken. Maybe I'm just an outlier though ;)

------
mattmaroon
Or they could just change their name to something people would take seriously.
Just a thought.

~~~
roc
... because the search engine market has so long been dominated by serious-
sounding firms?

~~~
Legion
My first reaction was to agree with your point.

But I wonder if there are varying levels of non-seriousness.

Names like Google and Yahoo definitely aren't serious, but they also have a
sort of generic quality. Not in a bad sense, I just mean they don't evoke a
specific silly image in my head - at least not by themselves (when I think
Yahoo, I see a big purple !, but that's by marketing design).

Duck Duck Go, though, doesn't have that same nebulous quality. There's
something more concrete there, and more specific imagery that comes to mind.
And I think that's why someone might react that way to the name and not to the
names Google or Yahoo or Bing. It's less vague, and decidedly more Saturday
morning cartoon.

Is that bad? I don't know, it doesn't necessarily bother me. But I understand
why some people view it differently than the search engine names already out
there.

~~~
mattmaroon
That's my exact thought. Google and Yahoo! come off as genuinely irreverent
and fun (but, importantly, not childish). It's like something you'd expect a
couple 20-something hackers to name their product.

Duck Duck Go comes off as the 50 yr old guy who yells "'Fo Shizzle!" and holds
his hand out for a fist bump. It's something you'd expect from an older guy
trying to pretend to be a 20something hacker. It thus comes off as insincere.

~~~
epi0Bauqu
Empirically, people seem to love or hate the name, i.e. it generates an
emotional response. When I talk to "normals" this love/hate ratio is very
high. I understand though that you've taken issue with the name right from the
beginning. This is not the first time you've shared this viewpoint :)

~~~
mattmaroon
Ha, yeah wouldn't surprise me. I don't remember it but definitely believe you.

I think what New Coke proved though is that haters have an unduly large
influence. New Coke kicked both original Coke and Pepsi's asses in blind taste
tests. It's possibly bad to have something that has a love to hate ratio, even
if a large one, rather than something people respect but don't care much about
one way or the other.

------
blueben
Is DDG engaging in some sort of grassroots campaign to make sure they get a
link on HN at least a few times a month? I get it. DDG is out there. They're
an alternative to Google. Great. How about some articles with merit rather
than yet-another-link to the search engine front page and a bunch of people
gushing about it?

~~~
epi0Bauqu
Nope. I didn't make this and I didn't know the person who did. Nor did I
submit it.

~~~
blueben
Take pride in the fact that people love your work so much that they will spam
their friends to share it. :)

------
arst
[http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=let+me+google+this+for+you&v=](http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=let+me+google+this+for+you&v=)

------
heyitsnick
[http://duckduckgo.com/?q=lmddgtfy&v=](http://duckduckgo.com/?q=lmddgtfy&v=)

------
resdirector
Quick question: what types of searches are better done through DDG than
Google? I've tried a few searches, but haven't found DDG better than
Google...is DDG superior only for certain types of searches?

~~~
epi0Bauqu
<http://duckduckgo.com/about.html>

Of course it is subjective, but it really should be better across a wide
swatch of searches. I think it is most clear though on what is X searches. The
information view (from the home page) goes even further on these type of
searches and grabs topic summaries in real time.

Other areas where I think we do noticeably better on average are with names
and long un-quoted searches (5+ words). Of course you can find counter-
examples everywhere...

What I always suggest to people is to give it a week as your primary search
engine. If you (or anyone) do/does, I'd really appreciate you getting back to
me with your feedback.

~~~
resdirector
Very initial impression:

* I like the zero-click info.

* Is disambiguation redundant? Can't you just infer from history and location? Or is this against your privacy policy?

The single most frustrating thing I find about search engines is iterating a
non-trivial search. It doesn't seem like DDG has an edge against Google here.
I long to see a search engine that makes it easy to send a question off to
Quora, Vark etc.

~~~
epi0Bauqu
How would that work exactly in your mind? We already have a feature to send
your search to hundreds of other sites, <http://duckduckgo.com/bang.html>

Is it as simple as redirecting you to those sites, or do you mean manage the
workflow, email you the results, etc.?

~~~
resdirector
(I like the bang feature: many of my searches are of the form "wiki william
henry harrison". By the way, I think the search results for
<http://duckduckgo.com/?q=william+henry+harrison> are out of order)

My _ideal_ search-engine would be a cross between a traditional search-engine
(machine) and a Q&A site (humans). If you were taking a lot of iterations to
find your answer, you could simply expand the text-area to allow you to write
out a human question.

So, short of DDG becoming also a Q&A site....yeah, dunno :P.

------
blahedo
In the early days of Google, back while it was still beta, I remember having
to go to my backup search engine—remember Altavista? :)—for queries where I
just needed a boatload of sites, or where I had a complex boolean thing, or
where I needed to search for a whole phrase.

Of course, back in the 90s Google knocked out my reasons to backoff to
Altavista, one by one, adding boolean queries, and phrases, and of course
adding a boondle of data. So I was eventually able to stop using Altavista.

For the last few months, DDG is my primary and I love it. I still use Google
for:

* a few queries that DDG can't find anything for

* to find out what _other_ people will see when they "google it"

* YouTube and maps.

YouTube will be hard to ditch because that's where the content is, although I
suspect I can wean from maps if I actually try.

------
asimjalis
I tried <http://lmddgtfy.com/foo> and I got this message:

    
    
      Unhandled Exception
      An unhandled exception was thrown by the application.

~~~
simonk
It looks like the URL should be
[http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=foo&v=](http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=foo&v=)

Although, yes a lot easier to remember your way.

~~~
asimjalis
True. Still an unhandled exception does not sound good.

------
natep
Sharing the link is really hard (at least for me, maybe I'm doing it wrong?).
When I type something and click search, it takes me straight to the page I'd
want to send someone, and I can't really select the url (because of whatever's
moving the pointer?). So, do I just have to figure out the url scheme and
write it out myself? lmgtfy just gives you the url to send someone.

~~~
arst
It doesn't actually move your cursor, just an image of a cursor. You should be
able to copy & paste the URL out of your address bar as it is animating;
you're right that just showing the URL after the user clicks 'Search' might be
more user friendly, though.

------
varjag
[http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=%D0%B0%D0%B6+%D0%B4%D0%B2%D0%B0+%D1%8...](http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=%D0%B0%D0%B6+%D0%B4%D0%B2%D0%B0+%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B7%D0%B0&v=i)
and
[http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=%E4%BD%A0%E5%A5%BD+&v=i](http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=%E4%BD%A0%E5%A5%BD+&v=i)

throw an unhandled exception.

Seems like non-Latin character sets give it bad vibe.

------
stcredzero
I think of DuckDuckGo as a "budget airline" sort of search engine. It seems to
be best at handling the "low hanging fruit" or the common case, but it does so
with better presentation, more convenience, and no bells and whistles.

By contrast, Wolfram Alpha is more like an arctic bush pilot. Or maybe that's
Cuil?

~~~
jacquesm
> Or maybe that's Cuil?

I think you mean 'cpedia'.

~~~
stcredzero
You are correct.

------
gnoupi
Oh, great, one more condescending way to answer people when you are too lazy
to provide a real answer but want to be """funny""".

Yay.

Seriously, if you are concerned that someone didn't make an appropriate search
on Internet before asking for information, there are nicer ways to suggest
that than that kind of sites.

~~~
cookiecaper
LMGTFY is just a tool -- it can be used in good humor or malice. This site,
likewise, but it has the added benefit of promoting DuckDuckGo and producing
brand exposure, and is therefore less likely to be taken as a slight; with
LMGTFY, everyone knows what Google is, so they don't take that as an
informative thing; with LMDDGTFY, few people know what DDG is, so they may
just assume that the linker is humorously and conveniently promoting a new
search engine out of personal preference.

~~~
gnoupi
I see the interest in promoting DDG, but the "let me take your hand and do
that for you" is and will always be a bit condescending.

You can tell about a great search engine without that kind of approach, in my
opinion. Because if your intention is good, this way is hardly the best, I
think. Most will use it like others used lmgtfy, or a more strict "RTFM",
years ago: as a "search yourself noob" end of discussion.

~~~
eli
I kinda disagree. There's a difference between saying "search yourself" and
"search for yourself using these keywords"

And depending on context, some people really do need to be shown that they can
type keywords into the search box like so in order to get results like these.

------
RyanMcGreal
Returns a server error when the DuckDuckGo page loads:

\----

Server Error

The following error occurred:

[code=CACHE_FILL_OPEN_FILE] An internal error prevented the object from being
sent to the client and cached. Try again later.

Please contact the administrator. \

\----

[http://duckduckgo.com/?q=test&v=](http://duckduckgo.com/?q=test&v=)

------
vaksel
Someone should make one of those blind experiments where you pull in the
search results from yahoo, bing, google and DDG, so people can do a blind test
to see which search engine is better

~~~
eru
Already happened. People seemed to have preferred the bing search results, and
the Google-looking page. Perhaps somebody can even find the reference for
this?

~~~
nostrademons
Nope, they preferred the Google results:

[http://techcrunch.com/2009/08/08/which-search-engine-do-
you-...](http://techcrunch.com/2009/08/08/which-search-engine-do-you-choose-
in-the-blind-test/)

~~~
eru
I probably saw an earlier tally:
[http://www.istartedsomething.com/20090607/bing-vs-google-
vs-...](http://www.istartedsomething.com/20090607/bing-vs-google-vs-yahoo-
blind-search-engine-test/)

------
senko
Crashes on non-ascii input. Example (query is "rašić" in utf-8):
[http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=ra%C5%A1i%C4%87&v=](http://lmddgtfy.com/?q=ra%C5%A1i%C4%87&v=)

------
helwr
Linkedin profiles with 500+ connections are still not at the top when
searching for people names, some junk pages somehow get higher rank

~~~
epi0Bauqu
This isn't true across the board, e.g.
<http://duckduckgo.com/?q=gabriel+weinberg>

In any case though, I'm happy to fix if you give me some specific examples to
work with.

~~~
helwr
try "geva perry" for example, he has like 5 thousand connections and on google
his linkedin profile is #3 from the top

~~~
epi0Bauqu
Thx.

------
asimjalis
I am curious. Is DDG running their own web crawlers or are they a front-end to
search results from some other engine?

~~~
epi0Bauqu
Both.

------
motters
I Duck Duck Went a couple of months ago, and have been going ever since.

------
shimonamit
I wonder how they plan to monetize this...

~~~
epi0Bauqu
It's fun. Why does everything have to be monetized?

~~~
ippisl
If you're not really devoted to monetizing it , you might be able to compete
with google on ad quality. google's really into getting maximum money , so
many times the ads suck.

You, on the other hand , could offer the most helpfull ads.i'm thinking of
something like showing the disruptive companies for a service your looking
for.

for example , let's say you're looking for a divorce lawyer. one option to
save a lot of money is using an expert system software to generate the
required papers. most people don't know about this option, probably because
real lawyers outbid them in the ad market.

So knowing about the expert system option is very useful.

Of course , you don't have to show only disruptive ads , but an ad combination
that offer the best knowledge for the user.

Now , if there's a way to make this scalable across many product types, you
have a very powerful feature, one that the big search engines would find very
hard to imitate, because it would hurt their profits.

