• cecilkorik@lemmy.ca
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    7 months ago

    No, it’s just trading one centralized search product that is free and profits by using your data and manipulating you, for another that you have to pay for and profits from you more directly but still has financial incentive to keeping you engaged and searching instead of finding. Run your own decentralized SearXNG instead and take it into your own hands. Search isn’t something that should be controlled by anyone who’s in it for a profit.

    • Ulrich@feddit.org
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      7 months ago

      still has financial incentive to keeping you engaged and searching instead of finding

      How so

      • cabbage@piefed.social
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        7 months ago

        Yeah, this is not the case as they run on a subscription based model.

        I used Kagi for a while. I stopped because it’s prohibitively expensive, and rather than prioritizing lowering prices they kept giving me AI features I did not want at all - hell, it’s the kind of shit I was paying to get away from. Mix direct support for Russian companies into the mix, and you have an expensive AI fueled multi-purpose web monstrosity that supports war crimes. No thanks. I just wanted a search engine.

        Their search results were good though. I wouldn’t mind supporting a subscription based model, but I’m sick and tired of tech bros and their bullshit.

        • cecilkorik@lemmy.ca
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          7 months ago

          Why would you conclude that a subscription based model makes them immune from corrupt financial incentives? Quite the opposite. That’s my whole point.

          • cabbage@piefed.social
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            7 months ago

            Well, yeah, they’re run by a corporation, which I guess means they need to show infinite growth to return value to stockholders. If so they can keep growing on subscriptions for a while, but eventually they’ll turn on their customers. So fair enough.

            I think that’s part of my problem with them honestly. They seem to always want to grow and do more, but I would rather have seen them focus on search and make the subscription more affordable. But as they need growth I guess that’s not possible.