DuckDuckGo's new privacy policy tried to explain why you should care
duckduckgo.com
duckduckgo.com
Beyond that, explaining things like this in plain English for people who don't normally think about things like search privacy are doing a great service for DDG.
Many see the news reports about Google and Facebook and are genuinely concerned yet unable to understand the technical details that would allow them to make informed decisions about what to do. They feel discomfort and would be very happy if you explained to them in plain native_language what happens and why.
I wouldn’t expect very many people to be all that concerned if you told them what kind of data Google collects – but they would be more than happy to get rid of the discomfort.
I'm technical, and I couldn't care less about search security/privacy.
The page screams out to me "solving a problem that doesn't exist". Why do I care that Amazon knows that I searched google for "shoes"??? Surely that's useful info to pass on to Amazon. In what instance would I care? I can't think of any...
The way a startup will win against Google is by doing what Google did 10 years ago. Give users better, clearer, faster, more streamlined results.
Whilst Google is chasing silliness like 'real time update results' - WTF do I care what people are saying on twitter? - a startup can stick to what people actually want - clean search results.
Pandering to an extremely small niche of privacy freakouts, I don't think is a scalable strategy.
(just my 2c)
I find myself typing stuff like +<keyword> way too often in google, because google to be smart by including pages just because they are linked to by <keyword>.
I wouldn't be surprised if others did start caring if the the negative side effects were brought up more thoroughly. After reading DDG's policy, I can't really point to where the negative side effects are. They aren't clearly spelled out and easily visible. I don't have much in the way of penmanship, but I'm sure that talent lies in the the readers of this website. Someone should clear up the cloudy negative effects of giving away their whole life to some company.
Side note: "Don't be evil" sounds just like the slogan of an evil company. :)
Some people will use DDG specifically for the privacy, and those links will forward the search query without asking any questions.
At least use the standard logos, or say google. Or proxy the search (not sure if that's practical).
If it's simply a better search then fine, but if the draw is the privacy then you need to be much more strict about the external searches.
Perhaps also provide sample query links to side-by-side comparisons with Google.
Summary sentence wouldn’t be bad, a la Google’s homepage.
I already do recommend DDG to people, especially those who I know that care about privacy a lot.
For example, I recently noticed that searches for "invalid JSON primitive" were bringing users to a page on my site where that error was briefly discussed a few places within its over 200 comments, but no where within the body of the post. I think people may have eventually been finding their answers by searching on the page, but I can't imagine that it was a very good experience.
So, I wrote a new post that directly addresses that error in more detail, and now that newer post is ranking for the query instead of the older one. A win for everyone involved.
If I had been unable to see what search terms were bringing people to my site, I couldn't have done that.
On a broader note, have you thought about focusing your branding on the "we are insanely private" aspect? You could add "the world's most private search engine" to your Title tag. I just looked it up and saw this search engine uses that angle: http://ixquick.com/
If you're about it too you could create a serious but not privacy-targeted front-end too and do some A-B testing on take up, retention, et cetera.
For example, I can type "!cpp string::length" into the address box and be taken right to the reference page(s)
I understand that that they do not store IP address/cookie/etc, but often by just looking at as little as a few searches you can zero down on the person in question. For example I have often searched for:
Citrix Blogvault
I am possibly the only person who will be searching for both those things.
By their account, if you search something (A) and then you search something else (B), there is no way to link A and B. They are two separate searches and they could have been performed by separate users.
Granted, given a ton of disparate searches, you could theoretically group searches by possible users — or at the very least, by similar users — by statistical means.
(Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, while they mention timestamps in terms of other search engines, they do not mention their own policy regarding them. Timestamps are not directly “identifying information” but they still significantly boost the likelihood that a specific user is performing a given set of searches.)
But I can imagine the benefits of keeping track of all searches done by one user. It can definitely be used to improve the search engine itself.
Get a bunch of other people on board, and you'll have crowdsourced your privacy. :)
I can't say I love the design though. I'd prefer a more professional look.
heard someone once saying things people experience are like a piece of string that passes between their ears and is gone. You need to make sure you provide a knot in the string so it doesn't slip through so easily, and the person remembers it. The cartoon duck and the name are that knot.