Why I abandoned Google search after 27 years — and what I'm using instead
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I had taken note of all of this hubbub. Then two recent incidents catalyzed my decision to switch. They were online financial transactions that went awry in part due to my own carelessness. But it was a carelessness bred by a once dependable search engine that has lately become nearly unrecognizable to anyone who remembers the days of 10 blue links and the motto 'don't be evil.'
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The first happened a couple of weeks ago when I was planning a trip to London.
The UK now requires travelers from America to obtain an electronic travel authorization, or ETA. I wasn't sure of the exact name of the ETA, so I just searched 'travel to UK.'
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The results were all about obtaining an ETA and I picked a link that looked like the official UK government site. It was not; the official site was lower, below an AI summary, some sponsored links, and other junk on the results page. Luckily for me, I did get a legitimate travel pass — but the site I picked overcharged me by about $70.
In the second case, last week, I needed to book a hotel for a Passover trip to my brother's in Connecticut. I knew there was a cool hotel we had stayed at before near his house but I couldn't remember the name. I asked Google for hotels in the town where my brother lives. Sure enough, one of the top results appeared on first glance to be the official site of the hotel I wanted to book. It was not. Once again, somewhat nefarious search engine optimization techniques allowed a hotel aggregation site to jump ahead in the results.
And this time my error was even more costly, to the tune of several hundred dollars in extra charges for two hotel rooms.
Google has worked hard to eliminate truly fraudulent web sites from ending up in its results, and for that I am grateful. It is undeniable that, in both instances, I should have been a more careful consumer. But decades of relying on Google had taught me that I didn't have to be.
After I learned my lesson, I did some research in search of better search. People I trust on the Internet, including the
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I gave it a few test runs. A search for '
Run as a public benefit corporation and charging a subscription fee instead of relying on advertising, Kagi's incentives hopefully will remain pure. If not, I'll be searching for a new search site once again.
Aaron Pressman can be reached at
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