“In a recent interview with Axios on HBO, Apple CEO Tim Cook was made to answer a very uncomfortable question,” Jason Cross writes for Macworld. “He was asked how he squares taking billions of dollars from Google to make it the default search engine for Safari (both on Mac and iOS) with his company’s stance on privacy.”
Cross writes, “Tim’s answer was honest, if not satisfactory. ‘I think their search engine is the best. Look at what we’ve done with the controls we’ve built in. We have private web browsing. We have an intelligent tracker prevention. What we’ve tried to do is come up with ways to help our users through their course of the day. It’s not a perfect thing. I’d be the very first person to say that. But it goes a long way to helping.'”
“For Apple to ensure that searching the web—maybe the most important and common part of the computing experience—meets its own privacy values, it would need to build its own search engine,” Cross writes. “There’s another solution… Apple should buy DuckDuckGo, invest heavily in scaling up capacity and improving its web crawling proficiency, and rebrand it as Apple Search.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Yup.
If you really want to wage thermonuclear war, wage thermonuclear war. – MacDailyNews, “It’s time for Apple to buy DuckDuckGo,” May 30, 2014
Plus, it has a stupid name that just begs to be changed to “Apple Search.” It’s perfect for Apple! — MacDailyNews, June 19, 2015
If you haven’t already, give DuckDuckGo a try today!
Apple allows users to easily switch to the privacy-respecting DuckDuckGo search engine on Safari:
macOS:
1. Click Safari in the top menu bar.
2. Select Preferences.
3. Click on Search.
4. Select DuckDuckGo.iOS:
1. Open Settings.
2. Navigate and tap on Safari.
3. Tap on Search Engine.
4. Select DuckDuckGo.SEE ALSO:
DuckDuckGo: What it’s like to use a search engine that values your privacy – November 5, 2018
Will Apple buy DuckDuckGo this year? – January 6, 2016
Why I switched from Google to DuckDuckGo – July 4, 2015
Why Apple should buy DuckDuckGo – June 19, 2015
DuckDuckGo has grown 600% since Apple made it a search option – and Snowden’s revelations – June 17, 2015
Apple’s default search engine: Is DuckDuckGo next in line? – March 4, 2015
Microsoft, Yahoo vie to become Apple Safari’s default search option – November 26, 2014
Apple adds DuckDuckGo option to iOS 8 Safari, ‘a search engine that doesn’t track users’ – September 18, 2014
Apple slams Google in Safari 7.1 release notes: ‘Adds DuckDuckGo, a search engine that doesn’t track users’ – September 18, 2014
It’s time for Apple to buy DuckDuckGo – May 30, 2014
Apple has its own search engine. It’s called Siri and it’s useless.
Would you like her to take you to Wikipedia?
In the end yes, no different than Apple Maps, Apple OS or CPU chips.
Yep, apple should by duckduckgo and make its own search engine. It won’t be as good, but at least you won’t be the product.
People don’t realize that Duck is no longer an actual search engine but a results aggregator
“at least you won’t be the product.”
On one hand that is certainly true and will help Apple’s reputation as a privacy advocate, even though they accept $12 billion a year in hypocrite money from Google for default status.
On the other hand the $12 billion annual income would be history, the cost of acquiring DDG is an added expense, and how do they monetize the purchase in the long term?
Although would love to see it happen, suspect the beancounter CEO will not bite. They have too many expensive hobbies already that do not dominate the market like Apple TV, Maps, iCloud, HomePod, etc.
Stick to the one that brung you since the beginning (Macs) and update them no more than two apart, forget the design tax while making them more powerful than PCs, and watch your second largest revenue source SOAR…
Should Apple have its own search engine?
We would not be asking this question today if Apple were lead by a competent visionary leader.
Instead, we have the feckless Pipeline “leading” Apple, where this and dozens of other questions about basic issues are asked on a routine basis.
Jesus dude did Tim reject your sexual advances or something? Your mom’s out of hot pocket pizzas and the basement walls are closing in?
You sound like you invested your entire life savings of $1,000 in September in AAPL and are surprised the markets goes down.
Don’t you have something better to do? Like go play in traffic.
You have no F-ing idea about what a competent leader is or how to run a company. You don’t even have a suggestion who might be a better leader of Apple.
Only a dolt would repeat themself as much as you.
No he is just sick of being invested in a company that he (and many others) are starting to lose faith in. Big-time. Been there,, done that.
While the rest of the market is rallying nicely, investors are once again b!tchslapping Apple. Volume is extremely high as investors are again dumping tens of millions of shares.
Week after week after week.
That’s not my fault.
It’s Pipelines.
You really need a pipeline reamed right up your R sole, because you are one, and you’re a moronic complainer. Please farq off and buy an Android, it’s made for r soles like you
Well, well, well, the banned always insulting village idiot Citizen X under new screen names EVERY POST to avoid MDN detection, never anything intelligent to say, just regularly spewing venom. STFU and go away already. No one wants you here…
Losing faith… based on rumors? Or getting stuck in the stampede of lemmings running to the cliff.. ?
There is no material differance in Apples business today from a few weeks ago.
Just a few rumors and the a very smart decision by Apple to get out of the unit number bandwagon.
Now if one believes that is worth 25% drop.. then that person should be out already…
If not.. then seize the opportunity Or maitain a cool head.
Von.. He is just too soft and impulsive and neurotic to be an investor..
He still needs to be babied.. and market does not baby anyone..
There are three groups..
-those who see opertunity here ( long or short )
-those who are pissed and are bailing out.
-And those who sit there and bitch and do nothing..
Crying , mommie mommie … is not going to get the stock up.
Bashing Tim left and right is not either.
Where were Vons, and alike’s praises for Tim in this historic fortune making journy we have had up until 2 -3 weeks ago..
(And oh yes we have had even worse bumps along the path..)
He is just too much of a crybaby. And so are few others .
All that said..
In 2 months we will know how Apple did..and what their revenue and profit distributions were…
Everything else is Fud …
Be in it for the long run…
“There is no material differance in Apples business today from a few weeks ago.
Just a few rumors and the a very smart decision by Apple to get out of the unit number bandwagon.”
You can’t have it both ways. Not reporting sales numbers has never happened since Apple was founded in the 1970s.
It is a protect your ass via a preemptive defensive move to shield the beancounter CEO and his cast of mismanagement cronies, to HIDE the DECLINE of the one-trick pony company. Anyone that does not see it cannot be helped.
“Crying , mommie mommie …” Seriously?…
Losing faith because why?
-The stock is down?
-They don’t update Macs as often as you’d like
-Their focus is on mobile and iPhones instead of (fill in the blank)
-Something else?
Apple still has the best products, software, and has been the greatest wealth generator of this generation. Could things be run differently? Sure. But that doesn’t mean it would be materially better.
They could crank out a new Mac Pro every year but I’m not sure that would impact the stock one iota. In fact they probably purposely aren’t updating Mac Pro because they’re trying to shift attention, their focus, and market elsewhere. Who knows. But I seriously doubt its because of incompetence.
I’m willing to bet Apple thinks several steps ahead and plays chess not checkers.
So go invest somewhere else!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There’s plenty of choice! Enough with the incessant whining!
Gawd, Sean the one thought wonder broken record over and over and over. Apple apologist snowflake can’t handle it, we got it, over and over and over. Time to grow up sonny…
Yes.
Yes, John Dingler, fartist.
Should Apple buy a grocery store? A gas station? A cement factory?
Yes yes and YES!! The same folks that ONLY want to buy Apple monitors and ONLY buy Apple routers and ONLY buy Apple brand round mouses and mouse pads NEED a place to buy Apple Apples and Apple Unleaded Gas! Why can’t I buy Apple Pro Cement for my driveway? Pipeline something something fired something NO I have no idea for who to replace him with, just, you know fire… grumble
oh and feckless something (no rant is a rant without “feckless!”)
You owe me a new keyboard for that one! The old one was drenched in coffee going through my nose!
They should buy you a brain, you need one.
I see you strained yours! That was lame…
Does the Pope shit in the woods?
Develop SIRI into a competent search engine and watch Google Alphabet stock plummet.
Start Apple’s version of Facebook as well while you’re at it.
And what APPLE REALLY NEEDS is their own version of a “YouTube” type service… Start with Vimeo, I mean they are trying to be a service provider right? HOW did they miss the idea that they OWNED the music market and didn’t have a place to upload and watch music videos, let alone every other subject on the planet.
Duh..
Duh indeed.
Pipeline is a drooling moron. Duh is all he can say.
Pipeline surounds himself with lazy, uninspiring “leaders”.
Someone explain to me why Eddy Cue has a job. Go ahead, I’ll wait.
Can someone explain to me how Eddy Cue is making Siri better/ Go ahead, I’ll wait.
Can someone explain to me how Phil Shiller markets the Mac? Markets, Apple Pay? Go ahead, I’ll wait.
Pipeline employs these lazy dullards and finally investors see that this group of cretins is going nowhere but down.
Shares have been hammered EVERY SINGLE week since the last earnings call.
All this is due to Pipeline.
Mr von Wank:
We all know that you can copy and paste your vitriol daily.
Pity that it’s pointless.
Go outside and play in the traffic.
Duh…you’re repeating yourself.
Duck Duck Go is a “competent” search engine with millions of new users and Alphabet’s stock is still where it is.
Apple’s version of Facebook is already active. It’s called iCloud.
Apple has a YouTube type service, it’s called iCloud.
Well that’s the problem. If you think the hash of resold online wannabe services that Apple collectively calls iCloud actually competes, you have not been paying attention. The only reason anyone would ever have to suffer with iCloud is the same stupid reason Windows sufferers ignorantly wed themselves to Internet Explorer. Too stupid to replace the default with something that just works.
Are you that far up Apple’s ass that you can’t see daylight?
What would you expect an Apple Facebook and an Apple YouTube to be? Facebook draws people to their platform by making connections based on every little thing you post there. Apple’s not going to do that, so any Apple Facebook would end up being Apple’s current photo sharing.
YouTube monetizes and misuses content providers, selling ads on top of YOUR content. Apple’s version of that would remove all the ads, all of the “recommended next videos” (because they don’t know what videos people are watching) so… it would end up being Apple’s video sharing via Photos.
The ONLY people saying that Apple should make a search engine, a YouTube and Facebook just don’t understand that the BEST Apple could do (adhering to their current privacy policies) is the weak non-social services they already have.
google has already used its dominance to distort american politics and federal, state elections that legally belong to the people. insidious, corporate bolsheviks. they’ve already expressed a desire to continue into 2020. no one should ever use google for anything. ever.
“Corporate Bolsheviks.” Good one. It’s true.
I know. America may never recover since Google elected dumbass puppet Trump to be the smoke and mirrors division of the corporate oligarchy
half of america has no idea. a point was reached when most of the citizenry were through giving politicians the benefit of the doubt. beyond weary after decades of political foul play, uncontrolled avarice, lust for standings of power, policy based on desire to spend, not to conserve
massive debt, its frightening ratio to gdp. if a million seconds is 11 days, one trillion seconds is nearly 32,000 years. amerca has had enough and they said fuck the political animals and the animal farm. they said bring in the wrecking ball. bring in a wild-ass bull. trump just happens to be that bull.
few in washington honor common sense. honest people afraid to run for office. afraid the left will destroy their life, their family. meanwhile, the hillary half of america has absolutely no idea at all.
I hope they could.. As much as i hate using google, i love the results i get from it.
.. Apples data, data analytics and search have never been up to par..
They dont even have their search on their own ecosystem figured out yet (emails, text, and music notes, etc… and derivatives like spell check, or contextual word recognition) ….their contextual understanding AI engine is far behind competitions. Imo
I dont see how before fixing all that they can have a competitive global search engine.
And their commitment to user privacy makes this a much harder goal to achieve.
You hit the nail on the head, Google is good PRIMARILY because Google is invasive. Apple has shown time and again that, even if being invasive would create a more engaging product, they tend towards being less invasive.
People seem to think that Apple could just spend a lot of money and BOOM Google, but without the ads. The Ads and all the other things Google does DRIVES Google’s results. If Apple doesn’t do the ads, and they don’t put invasive cookies everywhere to track and monitor not only those using it’s products, BUT also those using other’s products (which, they’re not going to do), then you’d end up with a search engine that is a DRAIN on resources for no benefit other than “It’s not Google!”
As Duck Duck Go users will attest, if you want to use it as an encyclopeidia, it’s great. If you want it to figure out what you MEANT to search for from the misspelled words you just typed based on what others recently typed and or visited the sites of, you can’t do better than Google.
PRIMARILY DRIVES GOOGLE BUTT DRAIN
Google provides 25% of Apple’s service revenue. Cut Google and poof your service revenue takes a massive hit.
Have never been thrilled with Duck Duck Go’s results vs. Google. Just not great.
I’ve recently set StartPage.com as my homepage. Searches and returns Google results anonymously.
There’s hope for the lifeless and whiners: get a PC, wash Windows and go Android. Take your homophobic, trolling asses elsewhere instead of continuously, rabidly trashing Apple, it’s products, its CEO. Look in the mirror and take your own inventories for a change.
You first snowflake…
I am so tired of the ads on the MD. It is a constant struggle to simply read the articles
It would prove a huge mistake for Apple to take on Google with an Apple search engine. For most everybody, “search” means “Google”.