Mozilla Exec Urges Switch From Google To Bing 527
Andorin writes "Asa Dotzler, Mozilla's director of community development, has published a brief blog post in which he recommends that Firefox users move from using Google as their main search engine to Bing, citing privacy issues. Disregarding the existence of alternative search engines such as Ask and Yahoo, Dotzler asserts that Bing's privacy policy is better than Google's. Dotzler explains the recommendation with a quote from Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google: 'If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place. If you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines — including Google — do retain this information for some time...' Ars Technica also covers the story."
Re:Google (Score:5, Informative)
I actually applaud Firefox for this change.
What change? They didn't change anything.
Marketing companies shouldn't just fuck everyone in the ass for their own gain.
You know Microsoft's privacy policy isn't all that better. They still associate your search with your name and ip address for 18 months after you searched. 'Fuck everyone in the ass for their own gain' is a bit of a hyperbole, wouldn't you say?
Clusty (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Better response would have been... (Score:3, Informative)
Google has been pissing me off recently with their toolbar updates that change the behaviour of the browser. If I wanted the new window/tab functionality of Firefox to behave like Safari, I'd be using Safari. Why do I want the sidewiki thing, or whatever it's called? Etc, etc. Piss off: I got the google toolbar as better way of searching for things, along with find in page option when I have the results. So it gets uninstalled.
How about Cuil (Score:3, Informative)
It surprises me that when there are discussions about search engine privacy, Cuil never seems to be mentioned. Or at least I do not see it.
On Cuil's privacy page it says:
"When you search with Cuil, we do not keep any personally identifiable information, period. Your search history is your business."
So is there some reason Cuil is not brought up more? Maybe there are resons not to use it that I do not know about. Or perhaps it is just not well known.
Re:$1,000,000 anyone? (Score:1, Informative)
Yes, because if he had put actual thought into the recommendation, he would have suggested people use Ask.com with AskEraser [ask.com] turned on. It has by far the best privacy policy of the options provided by search companies.
Bing's policy is no better than Google's, and the sole decision process here seems to have been that Googe's CEO said something stupid (though factually true given currrent laws) this week, but Microsoft's CEO didn't.
Re:Uh, what? (Score:1, Informative)
Citations, please.
Then on April 3, 2000, he issued a two-part ruling: his conclusions of law were that Microsoft had committed monopolization, attempted monopolization, and tying in violation of Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act, and his remedy was that Microsoft must be broken into two separate units, one to produce the operating system, and one to produce other software components. [wikipedia.org]
Re:Clusty (Score:4, Informative)
Switch to CUIL (Score:3, Informative)
Or you can use CUIL (http://www.cuil.com). It's a great search engine
As they say: Cuil analyzes the Web, not its users
Re:problems with bing (Score:3, Informative)
Most people will like the design elements of Bing.
shopping - so does Google
links to other products - so does Google
I just pulled up Google and Bing search results side by side, some font on my monitor.
I noticed a direct link to a PDF in my results
Have you actually tried Bing?
I just did a couple of searches in Bing and compared the results to Google, got almost the exact same sites.
Never underestimate Microsoft. The worst thing Google can do is get cocky and think MS is not a competitor.
Well there's a twist (Score:2, Informative)
And now they're telling people to abandon Google and go with Bing -- which is owned by a competing that would gladly kill Firefox if given the chance.
I really think Dotzler is a bit off the mark here.
Re:Google (Score:1, Informative)
Re:clusty, hmmm (Score:1, Informative)
It's the same search engine which runs the search website's of the US, Norway, New Zealand and Israel Governments. http://www.gcn.com/Articles/2008/05/21/Widgets-to-the-rescue.aspx [gcn.com]
Surprisingly big for a search engine that so few people have ever heard of.
use scroogle (Score:2, Informative)
+ ssl available
+ no cookies
- no personalization
http://www.scroogle.org/ [scroogle.org]
Re:Schmidt is just being honest (Score:1, Informative)
I admire him for ruining Novell.
Re:Google (Score:3, Informative)
> they don't have the right to deny requests from law enforcement agencies
This is true, if the government comes to them while they still have the information or before they gather it. The difference is, Google will keep your information around a lot longer than Microsoft will, and they put it to all kinds of marketing purposes that may be pushing the "don't-be-evil" envelope.
See http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2282232,00.asp [pcmag.com]
Re:The Blog Page (Score:2, Informative)
Yep, that's his personal blog (in fact, explicitly not listed in Planet Mozilla by his choice).
The background is trees - he recently bought a nice wooden house somewhere; there's blog posts about that too.
Re:Google (Score:2, Informative)
sopssa, with his fairly recent UID, is quickly parroting as a Microsoft/anti-open/anti-Google poster child... he was the first to post recently in an anti-Linux fashion and his obvious angst against open source principles in general... a quick look at history is revealing.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1473112&cid=30382128 [slashdot.org]
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1474872&cid=30399306 [slashdot.org]
Re:Make privacy easy (Score:4, Informative)
Don't you understand the concept of asymmetric encryption? I don't have to send my key via a secure channel. I can post my public key in this post for anyone to see.
Anyone who wants to send me a message, will encrypt it with my publicly available key and it will only be possible to decrypt it using my private key. That's the "magic" my web-browser/email software/etc has that the hacker's programs don't have.
Scroogle.org (Score:3, Informative)
I use scroogle.org .. it's a proxy between me and google.. and they claim to erase all logs within 48 hours. (I understand it's just a claim.. still it's another entity sitting between me and google). I've always hated the way when search results in google make you think they go straight to link (the hover URL is the site abc.com), but when you click on the item, some javascript converts it to google.com?redirectsomething=abc.com. That is just plain devious in my eyes.
You can also find the search addon at http://mycroft.mozdev.org/search-engines.html?name=scroogle [mozdev.org] which adds scroogle as default to the firefox search bar.
Re:Google (Score:4, Informative)
I find that Bing falls for marketing scams and SEO much worse than Firefox. Random download sites and outright scams show up in Bing first with lots of searches, while Google is much more successful at ignoring marketingese and just giving you the site you want.
For example, searching for Wii homebrew [bing-vs-google.com] gives:
Google:
Bing:
So basically, people looking for Wii homebrew and using Bing are at a much higher chance of getting scammed. Seriously, Wiibrew isn't even in the first page of results.
Going the other way, searching for the name of the scam (homebreware) yields (antiscam = site that explains that homebreware is a scam): ...
Google: antiscam, antiscam, antiscam, scam, scam, antiscam, scam,
Bing: scam, scam, scam, scam, scam, scam, scam...
Someone using Bing and doublechecking on what they're about to buy isn't going to remotely realize they're being scammed.
Uh... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Privacy fears (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Google (Score:3, Informative)
informationweek.com... [informationweek.com]
searchenginewatch.com [searchenginewatch.com]
Yeah... it happened.
Re:Google (Score:3, Informative)
Or startpage.com / ixquick.com which meta searches multiple search facilities and keeps no private information.
http://startpage.com/eng/protect-privacy.html [startpage.com]
Startpage is powered by Ixquick. The only search engine that does not record your IP address. Your privacy is under attack ! Every time you use a regular search engine, your search data are recorded. Your search terms, the time of your visit, the links you choose, your IP address and your User ID cookies all get stored in a database. The identity profiles that can be constructed from this cloud of information represent modern day gold for marketers. But government officials, hackers and even criminals also have an interest in getting their hands on your personal search data. And sooner or later they will...
Re:Google (Score:3, Informative)
Responding to a Subpoena [wikipedia.org] is not "volunteering".
Quite right, but while that fact makes Yahoo, AOL, and Microsoft look less bad in that situation, it makes Google look better. From one of the cited articles:
"Google is not a party to this lawsuit and their demand for information overreaches," Nicole Wong, Google associate general counsel, said in a statement. "We had lengthy discussions with them to try to resolve this, but were not able to and we intend to resist their motion vigorously."
I'd say fighting a government subpoena issued on dubious grounds is a lot more respectable than simply not volunteering information.