this post was submitted on 06 Jan 2025
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[–] [email protected] 160 points 2 weeks ago (6 children)

Kind of fucked up but tbf Google does similarly shady stuff.

Please just use duckduckgo (or SearX).

[–] [email protected] 46 points 2 weeks ago (23 children)

I host my own SearXNG instance, which miiiight be a bit of a bad idea because the anonymity of the crowd disappears but hosting your own services is way too cool to ignore. It's at search.gregtech.eu in case anyone wants to use it.

[–] vinyl 29 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Pretty impressed, very accurate informationLargest manufacturer in the world.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Accurate indeed. Pee is stored in the balls, cum is stored in the prostate

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago

Hahha GregSearX I love it!

I’ve used searX in the past and found it was decent but personally I am going to stick with duckduckgo because it just works better for my needs (especially since I’m on mobile).

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[–] SpaceNoodle 26 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

DDG is just Bing under the hood

[–] [email protected] 58 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

And Searx is the same. And startpage is just google.

But the point is they don’t track.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 weeks ago

SearX is dead; you should use SearXNG now.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I feel like Microsoft is way more shameless about their shady stuff. They've been messing around with impersonating google/chrome for awhile now, they recently had that thing where they would copy all your open chrome tabs, and then when you started your computer it would open edge with all your chrome tabs to trick people into using edge instead.

[–] vinyl 10 points 2 weeks ago

They aren't afraid of people complaining about them, they are afraid of the government, and they fulfill a hefty amount of contracts for the gov

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[–] [email protected] 80 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Microsoft does so many scammy things when it comes to trying to prevent people from using Chrome/Google. Even though Edge/Bing hasn't caught on, I really think them abusing windows dominate OS position this way should be enough for an antitrust lawsuit.

[–] TheGrandNagus 43 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

Not just Google. There was a performance "bug" in Windows Defender a while back that specifically harmed Firefox. It had been reported but Microsoft took 5+ years to fix, and Mozilla did the bulk of the sleuthing and proposing fixes themselves.

Now, whether MS were intentionally crippling a competitor's browser in the beginning when the bug surfaced (which coincidentally was around the time Edge was relaunched as a chromium browser), there's no way to know.

But after a certain point, a software company with a market cap in the trillions loses any benefit of doubt I'd give them in scenarios like this where it benefits them not to find a solution. And 5 years is far beyond that point.

Unfortunately for Firefox, they didn't really have the money for a lawsuit against a juggernaut like Microsoft.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 weeks ago

I was installing chrome on a work computer, and windows defender was automatically flagging the chrome installer (official, directly from google) as malware and deleting it automatically as soon as it was downloaded. It wasn't blacklisted for very long, I was able to download it without issues the next day, but I always have wondered if that was something they were testing out on purpose or not.

[–] MegaUltraChicken 9 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I'm having antitrust deja vu. Anybody else?

[–] Veneroso 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Hope for EU sanctions because it's going to be a rubber stamp for at least the next four years in the US.

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[–] [email protected] 68 points 2 weeks ago

lol the gall

[–] [email protected] 59 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

Usual Microsoft, using shady tactics instead of creating a better product or just focusing on their own thing and respecting user choice. They should grow up sometime.

[–] dantheclamman 25 points 2 weeks ago

They seem to pathologically not be able to help themselves, even with products that don't need to be promoted that way. I used Outlook for Android for years because it was actually quite good. Had a multi account inbox view, true dark mode, Galaxy Watch compatibility when those were all rather unusual features. But then they started trying to put Bing search in my long press menu system wide, using Outlook as the Trojan horse to do so, and I just found that too obnoxious

[–] tibi 16 points 2 weeks ago

I don't think they can. They would need to rethink their company culture, but because the current one makes big numbers go up, they don't really have to change anything.

[–] [email protected] 53 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

User: "Can we get Google?"

Microsoft: "But we already have Google at home!"

The Google at home: [reskinned Bing page]

[–] seven_phone 40 points 2 weeks ago

This is a search engine showing open evidence of skewing results away from true for their own motivations. Slightly comic when it is Microsoft doing it to Google but if they do this so blatantly how else are they more subtly redirecting our searches towards biased or even false results that benefit them and misinform the user.

[–] qevlarr 39 points 2 weeks ago (5 children)
[–] ThePowerOfGeek 37 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

This is a genius move to keep you from Google search

Seems more like a genius move to get slapped with another antitrust-like lawsuit.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 weeks ago

Corps don't give a fuck about an antitrust law suit. In the US, the party that pays the most to jerk off CEOs just got put in charge. Even if it was the other party, who only pays slightly less, the most extreme fines are a slap on the wrist. Hell, come Jam 20th it'll probably a tax write off.

Until the EU levies fines that would kneecap these companies out of business, there is no incentive to change the behavior.

[–] sandwichsaregood 7 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

I mean the original lawsuit was for aggressively bundling Internet Explorer and kneecapping other browsers. Which sure sounds a lot like a minor variation on what they've been doing with Edge and Bing for a while now, without consequences. Antitrust enforcement is not something I have a lot of confidence in for the foreseeable future.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Don't care.
They can fuck with google for all I care.

Google is shady af

[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Yeah tbh, it's just two shady companies trying to out-cheat each other.

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Bing/Microsoft are so scummy lately

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[–] BangCrash 27 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

The single thing Google did right when they first came out was a clean UI with a search bar on an uncluttered page.

At the time the competitors had search pages cluttered with ads and news. It was so bad you couldn't think.

If Microsoft makes their search nice to look at them it's going to get many more users

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 weeks ago

DuckDuckGo and Kagi managed to figure this out. Bing is the odd one out.

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[–] finitebanjo 20 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

With Net Neutrality gone, these giant tech companies could start bidding to make ISPs make their search engine default and have the other competitors fail to load.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 weeks ago

Microsoft is a pathetic little husk of a company, what a corny and predatory practice that not even google cares to do if you search other search engines.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

The Yes Men have already done it.

We need to get back to real fucking culture jamming. Andy Bichlbaum you're our only hope!

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

And just when I thought their endless begging couldn't get any more pathetic.
Soon enough they'll tell you a puppy dies every time you launch a non-edge browser

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (9 children)

Besides Privacy DDG is wayy better then Google And Bing + It has a better search quality.

[–] toynbee 14 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I prefer DDG to either as well, but in terms of search quality ... Don't they use Bing search results?

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