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Ask HN: Is paid search-engine model like Kagi viable?

31 points by behnamoh ↗ HN
Search engines are the first interaction of a user with the internet. Yet, something like Kagi requires me to login on multiple devices before I can use it. This creates an unnecessary extra layer which drives me away from Kagi—why should I go through setting up all this settings to make a simple search query when I can simply use google without an account?

24 comments

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subeadia
You shouldn't. If Kagi doesn't offer enough value for you to be worth that extra friction, don't use it. That's the free market at work.
ocdtrekkie
I would say the value is definitely there, when you consider the top links on Hooli, I mean Google, are frequently malicious. Though the biggest thing to me for Kagi is the ability to uprank and downrank various domains, so I can ensure the results I am actually looking for tend to be on the top, and sites which don't cater content I need personally filter downwards.
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bigyikes
Do you use new devices often enough that the login friction makes it not worthwhile? I could only see this being a problem if you're doing a lot of searching from someone else's device. But if you're using someone else's device, who cares if you make a few Google searches anyway?

I pay for Kagi. I log in once and forget about it. Adding a new device is easy with a password manager.

yoshamano
I'm in the same boat. If I'm using a private window then DuckDuckGo gets a search or two instead of Kagi. If you are militant about clearing cookies out I can see how it would be annoying. I sidestep that issue by using disposable containers in Firefox for everything except sites I want to stay logged into to. Those sites get a dedicated container.

Also, if you're fine with Google then Kagi is probably not the right product for you.

bigyikes
If I'm using a private window then my password manager logs me in with a single click/tap. Maybe you could benefit from similar usage
NoahKAndrews
You can configure your browser to include a token in the URL, or just use their browser extension.
dr_kiszonka
I am fine with Google ads and (to some extent) tracking, but their results are polluted by SEO spam. I think Google could fix it by letting me filter out pages with affiliate links from the results. Sadly, it will probably not happen because these links point to their largest advertisers like Amazon.
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mediumsmart
Thank you for asking this. I signed up for the training trial and will pay for the duo plan after that to help make kagi viable.

google keeps its 0.0.0.0 pole position in my search engine array

elashri
Kagi provides you with a key that you can use instead of normal login if you cannot login for any reason ( i.e Cooperate Machines). Also I don't think this is really a friction. Login will take a much less time than going through the google spam and SEO results (for one query)
victorbjorklund
I really dont understand why someone would pay for a general search engine. I would never. But obviously people find value in it and are willing to pay for it. So seems viable as long as you can get enough such people to cover costs of crawling and indexing.
distract8901
I pay for Kagi because it shows me what I ask for, and not what google and their advertisers think I should see.

It gives me fine-grained and permanent controls over my search experience. I have Pinterest and other annoying sites blacklisted. It actually respects advanced queries including quotes and boolean operators.

A search engine requires so many resources that there's just no way to make it ""free"" without turning it to absolute garbage. Google and DDG keep getting shittier and returning worse results. The time I spend slogging through all the crap on google to find the information I'm actually after far outweighs the cost of my Kagi subscription.

Besides all of that, if I search for anything on google, it will be advertised at me for weeks or months to come. That just isn't acceptable to me.

barrysteve
Kagi's really good. It's like 2015ish Google (slight exaggeration, but close-ish).

For my niche technical project it returns results where google doesn't.

A customizable or more focusable/transparent search engine could be worth paying for. The deeper problem is the content of websites isn't really improving, I suspect.

muzani
It seems to be what Google's original business model should have been. But we didn't have proper internet payment solutions at the time, so ads it was.
CM30
It seems to be viable enough for them to run a successful business with. So in that sense it's viable.

But I suspect it'll always be a niche product, since most people don't see search engines as something worth paying for, even if the product does offer some stuff they might find useful. It's like selling a web browser or code editor or source control system in 2023, sure you might potentially have a small audience of die hard techies that could make use of it, but the majority of people will stick to the free but worse quality one simply due to the price alone.

xulres
Like with every product you don't have to use it. I like it and don't have problems with login in even in some hellish corp nets. You are also on Hackernews if it annoys you to setup your devices one time before using the search engine... automate it. I just wonder what you do with your other software packages.
frans
I don't understand why the majority of people are comfortable being part of the Google product and getting served search results that bring Google the most profit. Configuring the Kagi lenses [1] and personalized results [2] features makes the search results so much more useful that I couldn't live without them anymore.

When I'm looking into a specific topic, learning new features, or troubleshooting an issue, I put the results that Kagi provides in a separate window. I then work through this as a reliable to-do list for further investigation.

[1] https://help.kagi.com/kagi/features/lenses.html

[2] https://help.kagi.com/kagi/features/website-info-personalize...

distract8901
Well, yes, when you use a service you pay for, you have to use some type of authentication.

You have a few options. You can log into each new device and save your session like a normal person. It takes only as long as required to physically enter the password.

You also have a "magic URL", which is just an OAuth token.

My phone has a search widget that doesn't support authenticated search engines, so I set up a custom engine and pointed it at my magic URL.

If you somehow really care about the two seconds it takes to log in, you could host a webpage that redirects to your magic URL. Then you and everyone else can use your Kagi account 'unauthenticated'

barrysteve
Kagi's search results are good, feels like google never died, to me.

It's really comfortable and easy to use for my desktop use case.

What makes me wobble about Kagi is about advertising on here with anonymized aggregated stats. He promises in the privacy policy to never share data (I'm paraphrasing, it's not exacty this wording) and then advertises with it.

It's not the advertising that bothers me, it just feels so needless to provide a sense of 'privacy comfort' and then provide a sense of 'wait you're gonna air my (anon) dirty laundry?'

Again not a big deal, but if he breaks his own rules (or suggests at it)... then he's not really committed and nor am I.

I know it's a small thing. I wouldn't mind 5yrs ago, but as everyone is so antsy about people playing by 'the rules' and constantly providing updates to software that doesn't need it, locking a relationship into place I didn't ask for... then the little things start to matter.

carlosjobim
For the majority of connected people on this planet, Instagram is their first interaction and portal to the internet. And that service also requires registration and set-up. So I don't think it's such a big hurdle for those who want to use Kagi.

> why should I go through setting up all this settings to make a simple search query when I can simply use google without an account?

Why are you asking people to give you a reason? You are free to do as you please, the choice is yours.

slikrick
Not until they offer a privacy respecting way to pay like mullvad
pschuegr
Yeah, TBH I feel like they should release a super-lightweight app that serves as a starting point for a search and then hands the results off to the local browser with whatever key set so that it knows who you are. This would significantly lower the barrier for people who don't know how to or don't feel like messing with extensions, etc.

Otherwise, two thumbs up for Kagi. I personally give zero fucks about Google's business model, but Google's search experience is in my opinion degrading very rapidly.

muzani
Personally, I developed the habit of opening search on incognito because of Google. But if something like Kagi or DDG doesn't track, then it's probably no longer necessary