@ernie Replacing what's at the _beginning_ of the URL is even better:
Gruber even compares it to what you suggest (more or less): https://daringfireball.net/2025/04/try_switching_to_kagi
@apicultor @kagihq I have been running udm14 for over a year. I have heard every single variation of this argument.
It's okay if you're not the target audience.
@apicultor @kagihq I care about quality search results. What I don’t like is the brow-beating.
Only one search platform has a freely accessible archive of Usenet posts, an embedded patent search, and the ability to search through millions of books. As someone who does a lot of historic research, I care a lot about those things.
All I said is that this isn’t for you and I have heard this argument hundreds of times. And you decided to be an asshole about it. That’s not a me problem.
@ernie I never said you shouldn't ever visit patents.google.com. My point was that divining various parameters to disable or modify various aspects of Google's search results does not change the fact that Google is shitty and has shitty results (and has for many years now).
Did you even read what Gruber or Doctorow have said about it? No amount of query parameters is going to keep the shit off your hands.
If saying it like it is makes me an asshole, then so be it. At least I don't hold any GOOG stock to worry about.
@apicultor @kagihq dude, he wrote about my site! Of course I read it!
My point is that these tools are just that, tools. And that browbeating people is asshole behavior.
You are not principled. You are just trying to force your point of view on someone who is literally just trying to make the Google experience slightly better for non-technical people.
Stop being rude on the internet because someone told you your argument is boring and unoriginal.
@apicultor @kagihq and to the Kagi team, you do not want this guy Stanning for you.
It should be noted that I interviewed your founder a few years ago.
https://tedium.co/2022/01/19/orion-web-browser-macos-kagi-profile/
@ernie >You are just trying to force your point of view on someone who is literally just trying to make the Google experience slightly better for non-technical people.
That, my good man, is my point: the search results are still shit (and in many cases dangerous) regardless of what else is or is not on the page, and promoting that experience as "better" is misleading and potentially dangerous to people who, in many cases, don't know better because it's not their area of expertise. You're taking something which can literally be dangerous and making it appear safer without actually being safer; in a way, it's similar to the attractive nuisance doctrine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attractive_nuisance_doctrine
If you don't believe search deserves to be paid for, then at least you could be talking up DDG or Qwant or Ecosia or Searx or whatever.
I don't recommend to my friends that they eat shit even if is handed to them on a plate that had been squeaky-clean until the shit was scooped onto it. You shouldn't either. We can do better.
Ernie Smith
Apicultor 🐝
Jack Yan (甄爵恩)