New Search Engine Duck Duck Go

The wonderful people at Pandia alerted me to Duck Duck Go which is a new search engine that's trying to provide better results with less spam. It has a nice simple Google like interface, which is as minimal as you can get. Depending on the search query, Duck Duck Go (I have no idea why it's called that by the way) either provides a small factual box with information (which unfortunately it takes from Wikipedia; disappointing), asks for clarification (Duck Duck Go knows Apple can mean different things. Which meaning?) or displays a series of results, though quite limited. Any serious searcher is going to continually be clicking on the 'more links' option.

There is a nice shortcut icon bar to the right which allows searchers to copy their search directly across to YouTube, Twitter, IMDB, Amazon and so on. Nice touch.
I'd like to see this engine doing a lot more however. No help options! No RSS feeds, no indication of any options to allow users to search across news, images, blogs and so on, without leaving the site. While I was happy with the search engine it didn't hugely inspire me to be honest, and while a spam free search engine is great, I generally do find Google works pretty well for me in that area, and I'm still to be convinced about DDG. One to bookmark and revisit in 6 months or so I think.

Comments

[Phillip Ruston]

I've heard my wife use the expression "Duck Duck Goose", which seems to refer to a children's game. Still can't see the connection, unless it's around the simplicity concept.

[Nicky Ransom]

Duck Duck Goose is a game of chase - the kids sit in a circle with one walking round the outside, naming each child as Duck or Goose as they tap them on the head. If you are called a Goose, you have to jump up and chase the tapper round the circle and try and get back to your seat before the 'tapper' gets there, otherwise you become the one doing the tapping. So I guess it is a bit like browsing through search results, passing over the ones you don't want, and clicking on the one you do. Not quite sure where the chasing comes in, though, other than having to run over to Google to get some sensible search results! I am not sure DDG is even worth a bookmark.

[Gabriel Weinberg]

Phil, thanks for checking out our site and for the great feedback. Please do check back with us in some time. It's amazing how much different and better we are from 6 months ago!

Gabriel Weinberg
Duck Duck Go Founder and CEO

[Gabriel Weinberg]

All, the name really doesn't mean anything. It is a nod to the Duck Duck Goose game, but it wasn't meant to be a metaphor in any shape or form. We just liked the way it sounds, its memorability, simplicity, ease of spelling, etc.

Phil, our Zero-click abstracts are not all powered by Wikipedia. In fact, we have many sources powering those snippets. It's just that if there is a Wikipedia one it takes precedence. Here's an example: http://duckduckgo.com/?q=Anakin+Skywalker%27s+podracer
Or did you mean something else entirely with your disappointing comment?

Also, I should be clear (and more clear on our About page) that our results should be quite different than Google. Not only do they draw on crowd-sourced sources, but they use semantic technology to identify topics within queries and adjust results accordingly.

[Phil Bradley]

Thanks for clearing up the name thing Gabriel. Happy to see that you don't exclusively use Wikipedia, so I'm very happy to not be so disappointed! :)