Forum: Author Hangout

DuckDuckGo vs Google

Switch Blayde 🚫

Listening to what people say here, which I do (especially when it is technical), it is better to use DuckDuckGo than Google. The problem is, when I do the same search on both I typically get better results with Google.

I like the way DuckDuckGo displays images better than Google's method so I prefer using DDG, but not if it doesn't return what I'm looking for. As far as I can tell, I have the same type of settings set, such as safe search off.

As an example, I was looking for drawings or cartoons so I started the search with "sketches." Google gave me drawings. DDG gave me mostly photographs of real people.

Am I missing something?

Replies: awnlee jawking Keet Dinsdale irvmull richardshagrin StarFleet Carl

awnlee jawking 🚫

@Switch Blayde

Listening to what people say here, which I do (especially when it is technical), it is better to use DuckDuckGo than Google. The problem is, when I do the same search on both I typically get better results with Google.

I suspect Google has more intelligence built into its algorithms. A bit like predictive text, anticipating what you're looking for from the previous searches of others.

Sometimes that's good, sometimes it's not so good. When researching obscure information, DuckDuckGo has pulled up some less popular sites holding exactly the information I wanted whereas there was no sign of them on Google.

AJ

Keet 🚫

@Switch Blayde

Am I missing something?

Yup, you used a bad example. "Sketches" has multiple meanings and obviously between DDG and G they used a different meaning as the first. In such cases it's always better to expand your search with words that specifically define what you're after. I never ever use G, always DDG and if DDG can't find it "it doesn't exist". So far I always found what I was searching for. Also be aware of the "search bubble" where G uses your previous searches and assumes you are searching for the same in your "interest bubble". If that's the case they will be closer to the top than with DDG but if they are out of your "normal bubble" your wanted result might end up on page 100. That also explains why "search for x and it's the 3th on page one" might not be so if someone else executes the same search with G. If two people search with the same words and get different results it tells me that the results are wrong.

Replies: Switch Blayde

Switch Blayde 🚫

@Keet

you used a bad example. "Sketches" has multiple meanings and obviously between DDG and G they used a different meaning as the first.

I used "sketches" because that's the one giving me the best results (with different words after it). I changed the search on DDG to "drawings" and once again got almost all photos. "Artwork" was worse.

Replies: Remus2

Remus2 🚫

@Switch Blayde

Tried what you described here, but did not get the same results. There must be some other variable at play.

Dinsdale 🚫

@Switch Blayde

I think DDG actually passes the queries along to other search engines, anonymised.
The way I do this is to search with DDG, keeping Google as a backup if I'm not happy with the results. That happens once or twice a year.

irvmull 🚫

@Switch Blayde

I tried "sketches" in DDG and Qwant (Qwant is probably safer, as they operate under stricter no-tracking laws).

Those searches gave me about 50/50 pencil drawings and shoes.

Change the search term to "drawings", and it's 100% artwork.

Change the region or country with DDG or Qwant, and see the different results you get. It's kind of interesting.

Replies: Switch Blayde

Switch Blayde 🚫

@irvmull

Change the region or country with DDG

Interesting.

richardshagrin 🚫
Updated:

@Switch Blayde

Some who are determining what search engines are called has a strange sense of humor. Both Google and Duck Duck Go are not what most people would expect a normal company to be called.

"Barney Google with the goo - goo -googly eyes

Barney Google had a wife three times his size

She sued Barney for divorce, now he's living with his horse

Barney Google with the goo - goo - googly eyes.

Barney Google with the goo - goo - googly eyes

Barney Google bet his horse would win the prize

When the horses ran that day Sparkplug ran the other way

Barney Google with his goo - goo - googly eyes"

Its a song from the 1920s probably humorous in intent.

Is Duck a reference to Donald Duck? It is a referance to names of waterfowl and also "to lower (the head, the body, etc.) quickly : bow. 2 : avoid, evade duck the issue. 3 British : to thrust (someone or something) underwater : dunk."

Google may also refer to a very large number, 1 followed by a million zeros.

None of these are something normally associated with a search for information.

Replies: StarFleet Carl Dominions Son awnlee jawking

StarFleet Carl 🚫

@richardshagrin

Google may also refer to a very large number, 1 followed by a million zeros.

You've erred.

It's Googol, not Google, that is 1 followed by a million zeroes. That's why a Googolplex is 1 followed by a Googol of zeroes.

A Googleplex is where Google's headquarters is located.

Replies: Lazeez Jiddan (Webmaster)

Lazeez Jiddan (Webmaster)

@StarFleet Carl

that is 1 followed by a million zeroes

Googol is 10^100. 1 followed by 100 zeroes.

Googolplex is 10^100^100. 1 followed by a googol of zeroes.

Dominions Son 🚫

@richardshagrin

Is Duck a reference to Donald Duck?

According to this, https://www.definitions.net/definition/duckduckgo , the company's name is a reference to the children's game duck duck goose.

awnlee jawking 🚫

@richardshagrin

Both Google and Duck Duck Go are not what most people would expect a normal company to be called.

You should consider Google as similar to Doover. Go-ogle was obviously developed as a browser targeted at porn websites.

AJ

Replies: robotica richardshagrin

robotica 🚫

@awnlee jawking

Go-ogle was obviously developed as a browser targeted at porn websites.

Nice catch!

richardshagrin 🚫

@awnlee jawking

Doover

The White cliffs of Do-over? Kent, England. I know some people who live in Faversham there. If they grew grapes they could make Favershampaign.

Replies: awnlee jawking

awnlee jawking 🚫

@richardshagrin

I know some people who live in Faversham there. If they grew grapes they could make Favershampaign.

Global warming means the UK is becoming as important a wine producer as it was in Roman times. Don't hold your breath for Faversham though: it's being concreted over for housing estates because it's swarming with migrants.

AJ

Replies: helmut_meukel

helmut_meukel 🚫

@awnlee jawking

the UK is becoming as important a wine producer as it was in Roman times.

Doesn't this imply climate in Roman times was warmer?

HM.

Replies: awnlee jawking

awnlee jawking 🚫

@helmut_meukel

Doesn't this imply climate in Roman times was warmer?

Indeed. Especially considering the Romans introduced grape-growing to England and the hardier varieties we grow now hadn't yet been developed. Plant growth can be an indicator of temperatures where accurate measurements aren't available.

AJ

StarFleet Carl 🚫

@Switch Blayde

Am I missing something?

Yes.

.

.

.

Oh, you wanted an explanation on what you were missing. Ah, sorry. That's simple. It's the inherent bias that Google as a search engine supplies to your search terms. If you had previously been using Google to look AT drawings from someone, then it 'remembers' that's what you were looking at, and biases your search results that way. I just used DDG to search for sketches, and the first two results were ads for Sketchers shoes. The third result is Tayasui Sketches. Images are half drawings and half tennis shoes. I also have DDG set for all regions.

My specific reasoning for that is due to the forbidden topic on the forums, and that's politics. I simply don't trust, through the empirical evidence of my own searches that Google will give me unbiased results.

Replies: Switch Blayde

Switch Blayde 🚫

@StarFleet Carl

If you had previously been using Google to look AT drawings from someone, then it 'remembers' that's what you were looking at, and biases your search results that way.

Not necessarily a bad thing.

Replies: Not_a_ID

Not_a_ID 🚫

@Switch Blayde

Not necessarily a bad thing.

Until it creates information bubbles, and those have been known to be a thing in academic circles for over a decade now IIRC. Too lazy to go looking for a TED talk that called attention to it right now. I do know the TED talk I remember happened around the time of the Arab Spring, and that was something the presenter pointed out.

Had some friends do a Google Search on Egypt at the time. One returned search results about the political unrest and protests in Egypt. The other got historical information on Egypt and information about making vacation travel plans for going there... and no indication anything was going on in Egypt.

Kind of like how in the case of a recently concluded trial, there are people who still the three people who were shot were black, and the shooter is white.

The shooter has a Hispanic grandparent(although the shooter does "look white"), and the three people who were shot are white. But information bubbles are powerful things.

Replies: Remus2 robotica

Remus2 🚫

@Not_a_ID

Kind of like how in the case of a recently concluded trial, there are people who still the three people who were shot were black, and the shooter is white.

The shooter has a Hispanic grandparent(although the shooter does "look white"), and the three people who were shot are white. But information bubbles are powerful things.

The media was responsible for that one, along with a general overdose of misinformation. I suspect there are some law firms salivating at the prospect of getting in on the forthcoming defamation suits.

Replies: StarFleet Carl

StarFleet Carl 🚫

@Remus2

I suspect there are some law firms salivating at the prospect of getting in on the forthcoming defamation suits.

Considering that Nicholas Sandman has already referred HIS legal team to Kyle Rittenhouse, AND the fun part is that a candidate for office is liable for his defamatory comments, at least ONE of the people that will be sued will be Sleepy Joe. Plus you have to figure MSNBC is going to get nailed for having their 'freelance' reporter chasing the jury. And those are the easy ones.

robotica 🚫

@Not_a_ID

Until it creates information bubbles, and those have been known to be a thing in academic circles for over a decade now IIRC. Too lazy to go looking for a TED talk that called attention to it right now. I do know the TED talk I remember happened around the time of the Arab Spring, and that was something the presenter pointed out.

You mean Eli Pariser's TED talk Beware online "filter bubbles" and his NYT bestseller book. But the online echo chamber (or cultural tribalism) phenomenon is known in academia earlier than that, somewhere around 2006 IIRC, when Second Life began to gather mainstream media attention, and blogging (and other "Web 2.0" contents) was to be the shiny new thing (and of course before that we have about a decade of work studying the effect from traditional media). Pariser was calling it at the right time when we can start to meaningfully measure the effect.

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Forum: Author Hangout

DuckDuckGo vs Google

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