Google has become synonymous with online search – to the point where it’s the only search engine that many people have ever used. If you still haven’t asked anyone but Google to answer your search queries — it’s time to rethink your approach to web browsing.
Here are four reasons to start using search engines other than Google for your queries.
#1 Stop Google from tracking you
Google would say its tracking of your every move makes services like Google Now better and makes the advertisements you see more relevant. Others might argue that your online activities should be kept private to just you.
If you’re looking to evade Google’s sophisticated tracking technology, you can search Google in a private browser tab, turn off search tracking, or switch to something like DuckDuckGo, which prides itself on the fact that it does not collect personal information from its users.
#2 Run more technical queries
As clever as Google’s search engine is, it doesn’t quite have the breadth of the mighty Wolfram Alpha, which can give you everything from Scrabble scores for words to the current position of the International Space Station.
Google can do a bit of maths itself of course, but Wolfram Alpha covers fractions, probabilities, and other advanced calculations in much more depth. It can even tell you the most popular words in famous works of literature.
#3 Search the deep web
If you’re clicking links on the deep web, then privacy and security should be of the utmost importance to you. To ensure that companies like Google aren’t tracking your whereabouts, you can use a plethora of better search engines including the aforementioned DuckDuckGo or Grams.
Most of the deep (or dark) web is beyond the reach of Google and indeed your regular web browser, which is why you need some specialist tools for the job. Our previous guide to the deep web should be enough to get you started.
#4 Get better video results
It’s pretty common knowledge that Bing beats Google for video, at least in interface if not in the quality of its results. Matching videos are laid out thumbnail-style, and you can hover over them to see instant previews.
You get filters that are more easily accessible too, without having to go straight to YouTube. Video length, date, resolution, and source can all be specified from the drop-down menus at the top of the page.
This story originally appeared on Gizmodo.
Comments
7 responses to “4 Reasons Not To Use Google For Search”
Or use You Tube to search for video…? It is still the second largest search site? (yes I realise it will only search video on You Tube but seriously if you aren’t loading your video on YT then your not interested in it being found.)
Also tracking I think I am more worried about the cookie trackers than a search engine that will show me more relevant results…
Cookie tracking??
Google owns YouTube though? they still track everything they can
*nix is important for me.
First results for a common search
google: Mandate Male Revue
bing: date(1): print/set system date/time – Linux man page
duck duck go: date(1): print/set system date/time – Linux man page
There is a good reason, a great reason not to use google.
@Jayd – this might reflect on your typical searches on Google because for me, searching on Google for “man date” immediately gave me the man page for the date command
Looks like Australian google shows the male revue and US google shows the unix command.
So, as mentioned in the article and user comments, if you want neither quality nor relevant material stay away from Google. SMH