Gibiru

Discussion in 'Gadgets & Tech Talk' started by Ken Anderson, Mar 28, 2019.

  1. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    Gibiru is a search engine that is promoted as being a private, uncensored, search engine. Supposedly, it's been around since 2009, and I see that it had been mentioned in this thread, but I missed it and had never heard of it until a few days ago. As far as I can tell so far, it seems to be an actual search engine rather than a metasearch, like Startpage and DuckDuckGo, the difference being that a search engine has its own bots (spiders) and its own index of content, while a metasearch engine simply add a different filter to Bing or Google results.

    I am trying it for the first time today, but the results look good. I haven't decided whether I like it better than Bing yet but it seems to be just as good, anyhow. I know I like it better than Google, which sucks. Given that, I search for a living, every day of the week, I will soon know which I like best. Given that I earn Amazon gift cards through Bing searches, I'll have to like it a lot better than Bing before I would switch to it full time, however.

    I don't like that it has a domain name that is difficult to remember, but then Startpage began as Ixquick.

    gibiru.png
     
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  2. Al Amoling

    Al Amoling Veteran Member
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    I tried it on something that I'd searched for the other day using DuckDuckGo. It didn't find it in the first 20 results. DuckDuckGo got it in the first ten.
     
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  3. Hedi Mitchell

    Hedi Mitchell Supreme Member
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    Ok call me stupid...but what excatly makes a bad or good search engine? I mean you look up something..you get various answers to chose from . Please explain.
     
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  4. Beth Gallagher

    Beth Gallagher Supreme Member
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    Gloria--some people worry about "big brother" tracking their searches, but if they want to know what I'm searching for they will really be bored. Search history is sometimes used to target advertising; you may do a search for toothpaste (or whatever) and then notice more ads for that product on the websites you visit.

    Also, it is common practice for some businesses to pay Google (or other search engines) to make sure their business comes up at the top of search results. And these days, you are likely to get more search results that are politically skewed since the major players believe we need to be brain-washed.
     
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  5. Hedi Mitchell

    Hedi Mitchell Supreme Member
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    Ok ok...had thought maybe something new in regards to search engines.
     
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    Last edited: Mar 29, 2019
  6. Hedi Mitchell

    Hedi Mitchell Supreme Member
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    I was at grocery store the other day and was looking at my grocery app to see what I needed next. Was in the bean section and picked up a can of pork and beans.
    Right above that was the Bushs baked beans but did not touch them did not need.
    But just as I backed away- looked down at the grocery list and Bushs baked beans had been added.That hacked me off!
     
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  7. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    Mostly, it's simple. A good search engine is one that finds what you're looking for rather than what their advertisers want you to find. Most, if not all, search engines have paid ads, and that doesn't bother me when they are labeled as such, but some search engines (largely Google) favor certain sites for reasons other than their actual value, which probably has to do with undisclosed advertising. Scraper sites, which have almost no useful content, will show up on the first page of the results while useful results might be on page 50.

    Google is also highly agenda-driven, so ideas or even facts that they disagree with do not show up in the first few pages of search results, if at all, while those they agree with do. Most people do not look beyond the first two pages of results, and many don't look beyond the first page. Google used to be much better, but their search engine is only a small part of their business now, so I guess they figure that they can put objectivity in the backseat.

    I am not so concerned with it for the reasons you might imagine because I don't frequent sites that would get me in trouble or which I would have reason to be ashamed of. What annoys me is that the history of my searches influence the results that I get on subsequent searches.

    In my job with a web directory, the topics that I search for are not personal interests, but have to do with whatever category I am working on. As an example, for the past several months, I have been working on the Minnesota category of the directory so in an attempt, perhaps, to be helpful, the search engine's algorithm determines that I have an interest in Minnesota. As a result, when I am searching for something that has nothing to do with Minnesota, it will give priority to sites that represent something in Minnesota, rather than the best results for my search.

    Another thing that they do is they look at where you are, and sort search results on that basis. From my ISP number, the search engine knows that I am logging in from Maine. Subsequently, when I am working on the Farmington, Minnesota category in the directory, and using "Farmington, Minnesota" as my search term, rather than giving me the results I am looking for, in Farmington, Minnesota, it will mix in results from Farmington, Maine, as if I didn't know what I was looking for.

    This personalization might be good for someone who generally only searches for things that pertain to them, personally, but it adversely effects the search results that I am looking for. The personalization feature is on by default and, while it is possible to turn it off, it tends to turn itself back on again without warning.

    For my purposes, I prefer Bing, and I am still undecided on Gibiru. It did well for what I was searching on yesterday but I haven't used it long enough to know whether it's better than Bing or not.
     
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  8. Hedi Mitchell

    Hedi Mitchell Supreme Member
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    I use Bing also.
     
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  9. Maggie Mae

    Maggie Mae Veteran Member
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    Thanks for talking about this Ken.

    I tested it by searching people I know of and it was very accurate.

    It allowed me to add it as an extension (add on) to my Firefox which I thought was nice until this morning when I realized it made itself my home page.

    It can't be an extension unless you allow that so I took it off but have it bookmarked. I kind of like what I've seen so far.
     
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  10. Joe Riley

    Joe Riley Supreme Member
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    Thanks, Ken! I have bookmarked it and will give it a try. More options are always good!
     
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