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Google Could Pay Apple $15 Billion to Maintain Default iOS Search Engine Status in 2021, Suggests Analyst

contacos said:
I am surprised the EU has not demanded a "select your default search engine" pop up yet upon set up.

I personally use Google Search only in private mode or Safari as a whole for that matter (not sure how much that brings actually to staying anonymous lol). The only annoying thing about searching in private mode is that damn cookie banner on Google Search. You actually have to scroll down to get the accept button and I always end up hitting the wrong button.

Anything but search is done via the Duck Duck Browser
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The only thing private mode is make it harder to follow your browsing history on your local device since it doesn't store pages in your browser history. You can still find them in temporary system caches. Your ISP and Google both still know where you are going and what you do.

Private mode has its uses, but just doesn't do what it implies.
 
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gmarm said:
I never really got this huge sum of money.

Isn’t Google the best search engine and doesn’t Apple want to offer the best to its users?

This should be a win win situation for both companies without any transaction between them, but I’m obviously very wrong. 😛
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It definitely isn’t the best anymore since they are actively censoring everyone’s searches now to cater to what they think we should see.
 
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Maybe the quality of search results from duck duck go differs from country to country. As a software developer I can say the duck duck is very bad at finding solutions on stackoverflow / find useful libraries / find documentations / find specific and relevant youtube videos. I tried it for a few months and really had to use Google here and there to do my job. And I really don't like Google for a lot of reasons.
 
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TheAustrianGuy said:
As much as I hate Google and especially their business model, its search engine is the only usable one.
Save your money, people will switch to Google search anyway.

I tried Bing, I really tried DuckDuckGo.
It was only one thing: Frustrating.
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Bing was never good, and would never use it (I mean - whats the difference since when is Microsoft nicer than Google??

Duckduckgo is really good these days, I almost never need to switch to Google.

Also because it's 2020 there's certain things that are actually hidden on Google, and can only be found on Duckduckgo.

Example anything health related - it's crazy how different the search results are between DDG and Google there - and it's all due to the fact that GOOG has obvious vested interests in big pharma.

I did a few tests that were mind blowing, anyone can do them - searching for Hillary Clinton email scandal for example, it was gone from Google. Things like that.

So Google is shooting itself in the foot with its "other" interests, be they political, monetary, or both (Google's parent Alphabet is massively invested in Pharma, unfortunately something Apple is also looking at)

All that being said - I would imagine DDG is probably still pretty bad in non-english speaking countries. It's only recently got good enough for me to use as default.
 
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mymacrumorsname said:
Maybe the quality of search results from duck duck go differs from country to country. As a software developer I can say the duck duck is very bad at finding solutions on stackoverflow / find useful libraries / find documentations / find specific and relevant youtube videos. I tried it for a few months and really had to use Google here and there to do my job. And I really don't like Google for a lot of reasons.
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Same here - I use DDG on my phone no problem, but on the laptop, I use it for work, and it's Google all the way - Google finds anything and everything on Stackoverflow, the most important website for developers... it's basically amazing at that. I am also a software developer - need to use Google for that.
 
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I read that as $15 million and was about to make a post, "That's it?" Fifteen billion must mean Google generates more than $30,000,000,000 from the agreement.
 
orthorim said:
Bing was never good, and would never use it (I mean - whats the difference since when is Microsoft nicer than Google??

Duckduckgo is really good these days, I almost never need to switch to Google.

Also because it's 2020 there's certain things that are actually hidden on Google, and can only be found on Duckduckgo.

Example anything health related - it's crazy how different the search results are between DDG and Google there - and it's all due to the fact that GOOG has obvious vested interests in big pharma.

I did a few tests that were mind blowing, anyone can do them - searching for Hillary Clinton email scandal for example, it was gone from Google. Things like that.

So Google is shooting itself in the foot with its "other" interests, be they political, monetary, or both (Google's parent Alphabet is massively invested in Pharma, unfortunately something Apple is also looking at)

All that being said - I would imagine DDG is probably still pretty bad in non-english speaking countries. It's only recently got good enough for me to use as default.
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Absolute nonsense.
 
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gmarm said:
I never really got this huge sum of money.

Isn’t Google the best search engine and doesn’t Apple want to offer the best to its users?

This should be a win win situation for both companies without any transaction between them, but I’m obviously very wrong. 😛
Click to expand...
I’m surprised Apple doesn’t make its own search engine.
 
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i know on articles such as this there are always loads of posts which refer to privacy, i have never understood what the issues are? if i do a search fir something then it doesn’t bother me that i get targeted ads surely that is better than just random ones.
 
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I set my default to Ecosia (which is basically Bing) because it makes me feel good, but I often have to use Google anyway because it really does have the most comprehensive results. It’s number one for a reason. Even given a choice when setting up an iDevice, most people would choose Google as their default.
 
I’d love to see further improvements to the Siri suggestions in the URL bar. They’re already pretty good, and the better they get, the more Google can be cut out of our lives without Apple needing to unnecessarily launch a competing platform.
 
If I were Google I'd really wonder what the risks are to significantly dropping that amount, even to 0. While the general population don't give a thought to what search engine they're using they still want the best results. So if Apple then is forced to use Bing, for instance, that person is maybe going to think there's something wrong with their device.

So there's interest on Apple's side too that Google are in fact the highest payer as it allows them to offer what is considered the best results. Those using others, like DDG, are going to do that anyway and I don't know anyone that actually chooses to use Bing or Yahoo.
 
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contacos said:
I am surprised the EU has not demanded a "select your default search engine" pop up yet upon set up.
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If you're referring to the MS "Browser choice" pop-up: the authorities intervene to stop monopoly abuse. Apple doesn't have anything like the sort of near total monopoly over the PC market that Microsoft had in the late 1990s. Even iPhones are still outnumbered by Android phones and the Mac is still a minority player in the PC market.

The issue here is with Google who have huge influence over Android and Chrome and search/advertising services and software services. Last I looked, the EU were very much on Google's case - whether they can/will do anything is another matter.
 
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danny842003 said:
The point is the majority will just use whatever the default is. Plenty don’t know how or care enough to change it.
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Yes, exactly.

If Apple wanted to put privacy first though, they'd default DDG.

Not sure whether anyone (normies) would notice or care. My wife wouldn't know the difference and would probably just call DDG "Google" as short-hand for "search engine."

But it's a business no brainer to take that $ for the search engine most people default to, anyway.
 
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Running safari in private mode full time now. Any data collected by google or ads is lost on closure.

Go ahead and take their money but most users know how to change the default search engine within 30 seconds of activating a new device.
Thank you for making it easy to do so Apple.
 
I'm still amazed that no one has been able to match Google's search abilities.

Even if you can't get your eyes on Google's exact search code... we still know what we want from a search engine.

Every search engine searches and indexes the same thing: the Web.

So how has no one else been able to create a search engine that has results as good as Google's? Does Google really have some magic special sauce that no other software engineer can ever figure out?
 
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