I switched my default search to DDG and haven't thought twice about it.
It's maybe once every couple days that I have to use "!g" to get google results, for everything else DDG works excellently. Even the times when I have to use "!g", it's often a hint that I'm searching for an unpopular phrase, and find that if I rephrase my search results I get much better results out of both search engines.
I remember there was a story on HN once a few months back where a kind soul from DDG posted an email address that one could submit notes to wrt highlighting poor search results so that they could address them, I don't recall the email and haven't been able to find it. If this is still available with DDG could someone please re-post that email here? I would very much like to help improve the quality of DDG to make it better for everyone but I can't find anywhere to suggest improvements on their website.
I switched my default search to DDG and haven't thought twice about it.
I have—it's about 80 – 90% accurate for me, which is pretty good but not always perfect. The search-within-site feature (i.e. "search string site:jakeseliger.com" is definitely not as good as Google, though I'm not sure why. Searching within Reddit or HN, for example, is not nearly as good.
That being said the !g button is great: if DDG doesn't work, the move to Google is fast and painless. I've definitely evangelized DDG some to friends.
The problem with 80-90% accurate results is that I'm never sure whether the results I'm seeing right now would have been better if I had opened Google for it - as a lot of times the answers are not in black and white to even claim they're "accurate". You are never sure without checking both results which one was more relevant. That uncertainty is stressful for me, so for now, sticking with Google.
That uncertainty is stressful for me, so for now, sticking with Google.
Google's answers are hardly black and white--part of being a developer, an engineer, or even just a high-functioning human being, is being able to synthesize an answer from several data sources of varying utility.
>The problem with 80-90% accurate results is that I'm never sure whether the results I'm seeing right now would have been better if I had opened Google for it
One could easily replace the word "Google" with "DuckDuckGo" and be facing the same quandary. In fact, having just realized that (I was in the same boat as you earlier today) I'm going to give DDG a shot and see how it holds up.
Sure, the same uncertainty could be applied to Google had it been a new player in the market and we hadn't developed a little 'trust' in its search results over all these years (not saying no else can beat them to it). I'm always looking out for new search engines, and may be one day DDG's search results will be better than Google's, just not at present for me.
wut? if you find what you're looking for then the results are fine. the google results seem to be deeper into forums but that comes from context. Google knows I'm a programmer so I get more tech related results on average.
Again, if ddg doesn't give me what I want I use !g to try google.
>> if you find what you're looking for then the results are fine
As a user I don't just want to find it, I want to find it easy. For example, the most (/more) relevant answer should be ranked 1st, not 12th on the second page. Also, a lot of times I'm trying to solve a difficult question - so the 'closer' it takes me to the real solution by combining more than one 'top' search results, the betters is the search engine quality. Also, I love how Google answers a lot of questions without visiting any website at all (on the top with its cards). I know it might be bad for the website whose information is probably being scraped, but it's better for me as a user.
It's maybe once every couple days that I have to use "!g" to get google results, for everything else DDG works excellently. Even the times when I have to use "!g", it's often a hint that I'm searching for an unpopular phrase, and find that if I rephrase my search results I get much better results out of both search engines.
I remember there was a story on HN once a few months back where a kind soul from DDG posted an email address that one could submit notes to wrt highlighting poor search results so that they could address them, I don't recall the email and haven't been able to find it. If this is still available with DDG could someone please re-post that email here? I would very much like to help improve the quality of DDG to make it better for everyone but I can't find anywhere to suggest improvements on their website.
Edit: I was able to find their Feedback page, but I much prefer email personally: https://duckduckgo.com/feedback