When you stumble upon a random question in your head or maybe you’re confused on a homework assignment, what’s the first thought that comes to mind?
“Let me Google it.”
The Internet is home to various search engine websites, such as Google, Yahoo!, Bing, AOL, Ask.com, DuckDuckGo and more…but is Google really the “superior” network? Somebody recently published an opinion article on BusinessInsider to compare Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo.
The article contains comparisons over a variety of factors, such as homepage, layout and search results, and you may be surprised:
Overall, Google and Bing ended up being really similar to one another in regard to design and search results. One of the differences stated was over something minor, such as how a video result would be displayed (Google’s featured a rectangular display, Bing had a square display), but does anybody truly care about the display of a video on a search result as long as it’s the same content?
DuckDuckGo’s main selling point is its privacy, considering that your search results are not saved and neither is your IP address. The design however, is a little bland.
Although I’ve only used Google for the majority of my searches, I was surprised to hear that some other search engines are not as far behind from Google as we think. So maybe next time, maybe we ought to try a new search engine and see how it compares. At the end of the day, your opinion matters most in deciding which search engine to use.
You can read more here:
https://www.businessinsider.com/bing-vs-duckduckgo-vs-google-search-comparison-2018-10#bing-offers-microsoft-rewards-points-every-time-you-search-12
Photo Credit: “ineedhits.com” via Google Images
Throughout most of my life, I have resorted to using Google’s search engine. This is due to the relation that I created with the success of the web browser. One of the first things I do with every computer that I’ve purchased is to download google chrome due to the amazing reviews that it constantly receives. Overall, Chrome is one of the fastest and most secure web browsers out there, because of that, I never think twice about using Google’s search engine. It is the default home screen of Chrome and it is just easy to associate the speed and security of the browser with the search engine.
However, over the past year, many articles and discussions in our class has shined the light on the other web browsers that emphasize more privacy and relevant results. The one that has caught my attention is DuckDuckGo, it has seen an increase of 50% percent in number of searches over the past year, mainly because it promotes privacy that allows for users not to be tracked with advertisements. The engine sticks to searches based on the keyword the user puts in and does not harvest any of that data. I have even made it my homepage on Google Chrome; while I miss the aesthetics of chrome, I feel better about my privacy with DDG.
Sources:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrsCEbi5N7Y
https://techcrunch.com/2018/10/11/pro-privacy-search-engine-duckduckgo-hits-30m-daily-searches-up-50-in-a-year/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2018/10/13/how-one-privacy-first-search-engine-is-benefiting-from-googles-mistakes/#228de6033a66
Naturally, people are used to googling something to get information. Google uses a simple platform too quickly and accurately give the user what they need. They also took advantage of gmail, and google docs which are widely used platforms. Google Docs is especially useful for students sharing information and working together. Since it is free, it is much more accessible to people.
https://www.businessinsider.com/bing-vs-duckduckgo-vs-google-search-comparison-2018-10 This article talks about how duck duck go does not use algorithms that google uses. It also talks about how duck duck go and bing are not far behind google.
Google is ultimately just the comfort pick for almost anyone who get on a computer. Everyone is familiar with and its simply was the cream of the crop for a very long time. Now though while it still may be better its just the comfort pick of all internet users. Hence the phrase “just google it”, no one says just Bing it or just yahoo it because they were so far behind for so long. A great example of this is the market share of search engines. The top four in market share consist of Baidu at 0.85%, Bing at 2.27%, Yahoo! at 2.51% and finally Google at 92.31%. Essentially google is a monopoly in this market and has no competition. Which brings up another question could our search engines be even better if google had any competition to push it even further forward? As we all know competition brings out the best products because everyone is fighting for their product. Have google gotten lazy and we just can’t tell because no one is even close to their level? I’m really not sure.
http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share
If other websites are similar to Google, then I would not use them simply because there is no reason to use another website to get similar results on Google. The only time I would use other search engines is if I wanted to see what the difference is for a homework assignment or a project to see which results satisfy my needs. Sometimes I use Bing, but that is only because it is the only search engine allowed to be used on Twitter to translate tweets. To expand on this post, I have found an interesting article that lists other viable and/or alternative search engines. Like this post, this article also mentions Microsoft’s Bing and DuckDuckGo, but it also mentions other websites you would not consider a “search engine”. These are Quora, Ask.com, Vimeo, SlideShare, etc. Each of the websites listed have their own special quirks. Looking through this article made me realize I use one of them often without noticing it. It would Giphy because I like using gifs to give a reaction that cannot be emulated through text or a single frame picture. This is because some applications like Instagram use this so that the user does not have to go to Google or another website like Tumblr to find a certain gif.
Link: https://searchenginewatch.com/2016/02/25/say-goodbye-to-google-14-alternative-search-engines/
I believe that Google is ultimately the superior search engine, even though there are so many other options. The other search engines are searching for the answer as to why so many people choose to use Google. I don’t believe that the answer stems from people choosing Google, it’s that so many people have chosen Apple. When you search on Safari, the automatic engine that is used is Google. I believe that this deal with Apple pushed Google to the next level above other search engine. Think about it, how often is it that someone will go onto Safari and search another search engine in order to search for something. This sounds ridiculous. This process takes away the efficiency and speed of looking something up online. I believe that this is the downfall of the other search engines. Google, already a leading search engine, made a deal with Apple, a leading technology company, and sealed their fate as superior. I don’t think another search engine will catch up to Google in a long time, if not ever.
This blog post is really interesting. I never really thought about how everyone’s first instinct is to specifically Google something. I know for myself personally my go-to search engine is definitely Google. I don’t think I’ve ever even considered using a different search engine other than Google. I didn’t even know that AOL or ask.com were still functioning websites. I feel like Google just has the monopoly when it comes to search engines. I would be willing to, however, look into using other search engines and seeing if they compare to Google in any way.