This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
At least they have an AI-free option, as annoying as it is to have to opt into it.
On a related note, it's hilarious to me that the Ecosia search engine has AI built in. Like, I don't think planting any number of trees is going to offset the damage AI has done and will do to the planet.
lol what? Do they have some kind of statement addressing that?
Yes they addressed it here. its kind of understandable given that they want to exist and everyone else has AI... But companies... At least you can turn it off.
At this point, not having AI would be a selling point.
I wish they would have talked about how many trees you need to offset an ecosia AI search
Yeah. I'm actually kind of upset that I have to type 'noai'. That should be the standard.
I hope they learn their lesson from their own poll.
I mean, the poll was like as not a publicity stunt, to draw attention to the fact DDG is not doing AI. All the same, the fact they are making "no AI" a selling point is noteworthy.
EDIT: I stand corrected -- apparently DDG does do AI presently. Hopefully they're serious about reconsidering that, then.
… the fact DDG is not doing AI.
They are, unless you opt out.
exactly.
I still get a bunch of AI bullshit unless I go out of my way. Also I swear they keep reactivating it as much as google when you opt out (or select ddg no ai as your search engine in Firefox and still see that garbage).
The article already notes that
privacy-focused users who don’t want “AI” in their search are more likely to use DuckDuckGo
But the opposite is also true. Maybe it’s not 90% to 10% elsewhere, but I’d expect the same general imbalance because some people who would answer yes to ai in a survey on a search web site don’t go to search web sites in the first place. They go to ChatGPT or whatever.
It still creeps me out that people use LLMs as search engines nowadays.
That was the plan. That's (I'm guessing) why the search results have slowly yet noticeably degraded since Ai has been consumer level.
They WANT you to use Ai so they can cater the answers. (tin foil hat)
I really do believe that though. Call me a conspiracy theorist but damn it, it fits.
It's not that wild of a conspiracy theory. Hard to get definite proof though because you would have to compare actual search results from the past with the results of the same search from today, and we unfortunately can't travel back in time.
But there are indicators for your theory to be true:
Now, all of the points listed above can be proven. If you put all of that together it seems at least highly likely that your "conspiracy theory" is in fact true.
Meanwhile, at HQ: "The userbase hallucinated that they don't want AI. Maybe we prompted them wrong?"
I made https://lite.duckduckgo.com/ my homepage. No AI and super fast loading. AI would be fine if it was opt-in. Shoving it into everything to see what works just makes people hate it. Looking at you MS.
It's horrible for the environment too and wastes electricity. It's fucked up that Google makes everything you search an AI search.
whoa nice! Thanks!
For people trying to configure that in mozilla (I am trying to get away from it but for now :/)
https://lite.duckduckgo.com/lite/?q=%25s (this has to be =%s, lemmy keeps mutilating that to =%25s everytime I save my post)Done.
THE AI by default marketing is failing? Shocker
I think LLMs are fine for specific uses. A useful technology for brainstorming, debugging code, generic code examples, etc. People are just weary of oligarchs mandating how we use technology. We want to be customers but they want to instead shape how we work, as if we are livestock
Right? Like let me choose if and when I want to use it. Don't shove it down our throats and then complain when we get upset or don't use it how you want us to use it. We'll use it however we want to use it, not you.
I should further add - don't fucking use it in places it's not capable of properly functioning and then trying to deflect the blame on the AI from yourself, like what Air Canada did.
When Air Canada's chatbot gave incorrect information to a traveller, the airline argued its chatbot is "responsible for its own actions".
Artificial intelligence is having a growing impact on the way we travel, and a remarkable new case shows what AI-powered chatbots can get wrong – and who should pay. In 2022, Air Canada's chatbot promised a discount that wasn't available to passenger Jake Moffatt, who was assured that he could book a full-fare flight for his grandmother's funeral and then apply for a bereavement fare after the fact.
According to a civil-resolutions tribunal decision last Wednesday, when Moffatt applied for the discount, the airline said the chatbot had been wrong – the request needed to be submitted before the flight – and it wouldn't offer the discount. Instead, the airline said the chatbot was a "separate legal entity that is responsible for its own actions". Air Canada argued that Moffatt should have gone to the link provided by the chatbot, where he would have seen the correct policy.
The British Columbia Civil Resolution Tribunal rejected that argument, ruling that Air Canada had to pay Moffatt $812.02 (£642.64) in damages and tribunal fees
Google became crap ever since they added AI. Microsoft became crap ever since they added AI. OpenAI started losing money the moment they started working on AI. Coincidence? I think not!
Rational people don't want Abominable Intelligence anywhere near them.
Personally, I don't mind the AI overviews, but they shouldn't show up every time you do a search. That's just a waste of energy.
Google became crap about 10 years ago when they added the product banner in the top, and had the first 5-10 search results be promoted ads. Long before they ever considered adding AI.
And how much of their budget are they blowing on AI features despite polls showing their regular users don't even want it? Probably also 90%.
As much as I agree with this poll, duck duck go is a very self selecting audience. The number doesn’t actually mean much statistically.
If the general public knew that “AI” is much closer to predictive text than intelligence they might be more wary of it
AI? FuckFuckNo
NOW the question is, will they listen? Cause we've seen so many times where a company says they're taking feedback and then do the thing that their audience didn't want them to do in the first place anyways. Now, of course, they could have more data and metrics that says people don't care or do want the BS, but I doubt all the companies that DID go hard into AI actually looked at legit numbers, since all the big heads are now saying "why aren't you people using this stuff?"
It's so funny to see this pushed out as a marketing campaign for DuckDuckGo AI and it totally flopped.
If they take the poll to heart it can still be a sucess. They can advertise that they listened to their users and changed course.
That's the thing about really good marketing - it should not only drive users to use your service, but the reactions to that marketing can be used as market research to improve your product and future marketing in a manner that drives even more users to your product.
I would like to petition to rename AI to
Simulated
Human
Intelligence
Technology
Couple months ago, I learned that duckduckgo has settings about disabling AI content. Settings>AI features.
Easy as that.
omfg you don't say
Okay, so that’s not what the article says. It says that 90% of respondents don’t want AI search.
Moreover, the article goes into detail about how DuckDuckGo is still going to implement AI anyway.
Seriously, titles in subs like this need better moderation.
The title was clearly engineered to generate clicks and drive engagement. That is not how journalism should function.
That's when the Silicon Valley types all bring out the ol' "People don't know what they want until you show it to them." Well, they already showed what LLM can do and it's not that great.
It's funny how many people ruffle their feathers over this. Same type of comments as when somebody first shared this poll here: you can't expect this to be representative, it's not a yes/no question etc.
Let's put it like this: I do not want AI pushed on me in almost every online situation. That is a yes/no question to me.
Why? Because it's not ready, wastes the planet, and is the USA's big gamble.