It’s funny how brand reputation and impression works.
I do not remember every story that has been posted about Brave since its inception. I always remember my emotional takeaway, which is that I don’t trust it.
My fuzzy memory on it is: something about brokering my private data, which I never want shared period, something about optimizing my relationship with ads which I want nothing to do with, something about a crypto scam.
The "brokering of data" is in-device. They don't get to access any of it.
You don't anything to do with ads? Just don't sign up to the rewards system. It's opt-in.
The "crypto scam"? What part of it is a scam, if at no point users are required to put any money or buy anything to participate? It is also opt-in, and the token exists mostly because it is the only way possible for them to pay users their share of revenues anywhere in the world without having to become a money transmitter themselves.
Brave has a long history of doing unethical things. You covered some of them, another is the time they hijacked affiliate codes in URLs without disclosing it. They turned it off when they got caught and claimed it was a mistake. https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2020/06/06/the-brave-we...
Another recent incident was with them appending affiliate codes to specific crypto-related URLs by default. It was fixed after public outcry (the option still remains) at least, but I personally believe something like that shouldn't be in software at all, full stop.
It's funny how powerful genuinely acting honorable and having a good reputation can be in a world where everyone seems to think you can get away with sociopathic behavior.
Good stuff, however comparisons to duck and Google for first billion users is misleading since internet use has exploded exponentially since last decade. You’d expect it to be easier to get more nominal use.
Also, as much as I dislike ads I think web3/crypto grifting is worse. I feel ambivalent =\.
I’m curious to read how Goggles is architected technically. Allowing anyone to create their own defacto index seems intractable with Google level performance.
> Also, as much as I dislike ads I think web3/crypto grifting is worse. I feel ambivalent =\.
I super briefly skimmed the crypto (BAT) token stuff. I think the general idea of earning tokens for searching and browsing is neat, but the way they're trying to use it directly as a microtransaction currency isn't super innovative.
I don't like crypto in general, but I think the "proof of idle capacity" tokens have stumbled onto something that could be valuable for online reputation because they invert economies of scale in a way.
Take something like Chia (XCH) as an example. As a typical user I can allocate some idle storage space to mining and, as long as I only mine while I'm browsing the internet, the incremental cost to me is basically $0. Compare that to someone building a rig specifically for mining. They have costs, I don't.
Assume I can opt in by plotting some proofs on idle storage and mining into a pool where rewards are split up and some of the rewards (aka tokens) can only be used for liking (ranking up) or disliking (ranking down) websites. Ex: 20% of your rewards go to the pool operator (search index), 5% can be donated directly to sites or creators you like, and 75% go to ranking (search reputation) which "burns" them. Adjust the ratios as needed.
A million normal users with 10GB of spare storage cancels out 10PB of storage from bad actors trying to game the system. IE: What's free for the masses is expensive to game and the more users hate your site, the more expensive it is for you to game the results. If you never give users "real" money (aka redeemable tokens) as rewards there's not much incentive to buy storage just to "earn" crypto currency, so hopefully you'd keep it limited to using truly idle resources only.
The search index (ex: Brave) could use the tokens as a currency for selling ads (ie: keywords) and that could be weighted by the reputation score of the site you're driving traffic to. In other words, the effectiveness of your ad buys is impacted by your existing reputation and if you have a site that everyone hates you'll eventually get to the point where ads for your keywords cost significantly more than competitors that are well liked.
Now everyone on Hacker News can tell me why that's a dumb idea :-) Lol.
>Does anybody find the constant promotion of Brave on HN annoying?
Yes, its extremely annoying, and I do not trust anyone saying positive things about Brave or its other product offerings. Brave is a shady company that:
>puts profits over privacy
>impersonates well known influencers to sell their products without their knowledge
>constantly pushes their cryptocurrency, functionality completely unrelated to web browsing and of negative value to anyone caring about their privacy
>their search results appear to be based off of google, despite claiming an independent index. all of your queries may just be going to google anyways
>the browser frequently sends telemetry to their servers
>they have consistently added more spyware to the browser unless users en masse call them out, which only happens some of the time
I don't think for a second you are being downvoted by real hacker news users. Brave has created some sort of native marketing arm or something that drowns out any criticisms with vague positive comments like "I've been using brave search, more privacy and better search results than google!". Something is truly fishy about Brave, and I refuse to go anywhere near their products.
I love Brave and have commented positively about my experience with it in the past. But I’ve never owned crypto, and I don’t comment on it much (or positively) on HN or elsewhere. Just an N = 1, but I imagine I’m not alone.
> Does anybody find the constant promotion of Brave on HN annoying? Everytime I look at comments its the same handles who are also pro-crypto
No, because I don't judge individual comments based on what handle is attached to it. If you make a shitty comment, it's a shitty comment no matter if you're pro/against cryptocurrencies. And if it's good, it's good, no matter previous stances.
> Does anybody find the constant promotion of Brave on HN annoying?
Sometimes it is, but in this case it's actually an hacker newsworthy innovation.
> Everytime I look at comments its the same handles who are also pro-crypto
I'm 100% not into crypto. I don't like it's environmental impact and I'm not sure it will hold value long term. That said, it is an area where a lot of really smart people are trying to solve big problems... and maybe something of great utility will emerge.
> I can't take a browser serious when there are conflict of interset especially monetary ones in promoting it in public
I'm not sure what you mean here. Brave makes money by doing something other than either asking for donations (Mozilla), advertising (Mozilla, Chrome) or selling your data to whoever (lots of smaller browser companies)? Brave's interest in Crypto is a little strange, but the have made a great product, they are actively innovating, and their browser is really a better chrome than the original.
I mostly see people raging against Brave, not shilling for crypto. One of the main reasons I post in these threads is a bunch of unhinged stuff people spout nonstop that hasn't matched my experience using the browser at all. I pretty much just use it as a Chromium with better defaults and like that they're building their own search index. The tipping system seems interesting but I haven't bothered with it thus far. It's just a good browser, IME, from a team that understands their job is to make a good tool.
Honestly no. As I wrote in another comment I don't trust Brave, but I do like to follow along with their progress. Also it's nice to see that there a products out there that are trying new things and that they have people who are passionate about them.
You could ask the same question in respect to something like VSCode, Github or Kubernetes. It's fine, just skip the news and comments about stuff you don't care about.
I think there is a high interest factor on HN for competitors to google search. Brave isn't the only one that comes up. Some combination of google being frustrating for power users, increasingly evil in moral alignment, and obnoxiosly dominant in its role makes competition an interesting topic here.
Not really. I count about 19 stories about Brave in the past 30 days. Compare that with at minimum 33 stories related to just Google searches. That's not including non-search related threads about Chrome, Analytics, Maps, Alphabet etc. Otherwise it's hundreds of stories.
I'm not a fan or user of Brave yet I don't consider a story every other day or so to be excessive.
> it's been the best replacement for Google I've ever tried
That’s quite an endorsement. I went ahead and added Brave Search to xSearch (an iPhone/iPad Safari extension that gives you keyword SE selection) to give it the college try.
I have tried using Brave Search (as well as DuckDuckGo) as alternatives to Google but I always had to keep switching back to using Google with the !g bang.
Recently however I have been using Kagi and I think I have found the one search engine that is better than google.
It has been great in every query, allows a ton of customization of ranking, and the people behind it make the Orion browser as well which has been my main driver.
Interesting so many separate search engines recently. Are they all primarily using Bing’s index? Otherwise it would have to be too hard to build up enough of an index and ranking system with how big the web is. Bing itself can’t keep up with the web like Google can.
I recently install Brave and when I used it for a few hours I didn't realise the default search engine is not Google! Only after a few 'quirkiness' results that I realised I used Brave Search.
Now I only switch to Google Search once in a while.
Google collects so many data it is difficult to beat, but i was impressed seeing that Brave Search is just miles better than ddg and has way less problems understanding which language i’m using and providing localised results (i’m not from the us)
Brave has a long way to go, but they results are sometimes better than Google on technical searches, which was the only reason I started using Google Search back in 2000.
I'm the same way... they still have some work to do, but there are plenty of spots that are better than google such as code snippets. Its my default search now
I think Brave Search is better than DuckDuckGo, especially when searching for "local" places. The only problem I have is that it's about twice as slow as DuckDuckGo at best, and about 5 times as slow at worst.
> Transparency: We don’t censor, bias, filter, or downrank results (unless legally required to)
Is it me or does the description not match the bullet? To me 'transparency' would be 'we detail on this page exactly how we bias/filter/downrank results (except where legally required not to)'.
Second point somewhat implicit in the first: how can a search engine be said not to bias/filter/downrank results? That's the whole job? I think what they mean is they have some generic algorithm, and there's no special casing going on to further political or social ideals etc.?
Circling back to the first - I think you can even do that (if you want) and claim transparency, you just have to say 'we aggressively downrank anything to do with XY rights' or whatever, and it might not be what everyone wants but it will be transparent?
Switched to Brave when DDG revealed its focus on politics. It has been a very pleasant transition, and I haven't missed the !g bang as much as anticipated. Turns out falling back to Google isn't needed nearly as often with Brave as it was with DDG.
I don't know why, but I had a very negative impression of Brave for a long time. I still haven't tried their browser, but the search is suprisingly good! It also uses their own web index, which I find to be very impressive.
[+] [-] dang|3 years ago|reply
Brave Search Goggles: Alter search rankings with rules and filters - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31837986 - June 2022 (45 comments)
[+] [-] user3939382|3 years ago|reply
I do not remember every story that has been posted about Brave since its inception. I always remember my emotional takeaway, which is that I don’t trust it.
My fuzzy memory on it is: something about brokering my private data, which I never want shared period, something about optimizing my relationship with ads which I want nothing to do with, something about a crypto scam.
[+] [-] rglullis|3 years ago|reply
You don't anything to do with ads? Just don't sign up to the rewards system. It's opt-in.
The "crypto scam"? What part of it is a scam, if at no point users are required to put any money or buy anything to participate? It is also opt-in, and the token exists mostly because it is the only way possible for them to pay users their share of revenues anywhere in the world without having to become a money transmitter themselves.
[+] [-] NelsonMinar|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stepupmakeup|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mrweasel|3 years ago|reply
I have absolutely NOTHING to back up that feeling, but I'm profusely against using any of their products.
[+] [-] lfkdev|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] natly|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dubswithus|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] endisneigh|3 years ago|reply
Also, as much as I dislike ads I think web3/crypto grifting is worse. I feel ambivalent =\.
I’m curious to read how Goggles is architected technically. Allowing anyone to create their own defacto index seems intractable with Google level performance.
[+] [-] dubswithus|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ryan29|3 years ago|reply
I super briefly skimmed the crypto (BAT) token stuff. I think the general idea of earning tokens for searching and browsing is neat, but the way they're trying to use it directly as a microtransaction currency isn't super innovative.
I don't like crypto in general, but I think the "proof of idle capacity" tokens have stumbled onto something that could be valuable for online reputation because they invert economies of scale in a way.
Take something like Chia (XCH) as an example. As a typical user I can allocate some idle storage space to mining and, as long as I only mine while I'm browsing the internet, the incremental cost to me is basically $0. Compare that to someone building a rig specifically for mining. They have costs, I don't.
Assume I can opt in by plotting some proofs on idle storage and mining into a pool where rewards are split up and some of the rewards (aka tokens) can only be used for liking (ranking up) or disliking (ranking down) websites. Ex: 20% of your rewards go to the pool operator (search index), 5% can be donated directly to sites or creators you like, and 75% go to ranking (search reputation) which "burns" them. Adjust the ratios as needed.
A million normal users with 10GB of spare storage cancels out 10PB of storage from bad actors trying to game the system. IE: What's free for the masses is expensive to game and the more users hate your site, the more expensive it is for you to game the results. If you never give users "real" money (aka redeemable tokens) as rewards there's not much incentive to buy storage just to "earn" crypto currency, so hopefully you'd keep it limited to using truly idle resources only.
The search index (ex: Brave) could use the tokens as a currency for selling ads (ie: keywords) and that could be weighted by the reputation score of the site you're driving traffic to. In other words, the effectiveness of your ad buys is impacted by your existing reputation and if you have a site that everyone hates you'll eventually get to the point where ads for your keywords cost significantly more than competitors that are well liked.
Now everyone on Hacker News can tell me why that's a dumb idea :-) Lol.
[+] [-] philjohn|3 years ago|reply
They complained that the ads they're getting aren't interesting and are just in general crap.
Yeah, that's what the web was like before advertisers could go "hey, if you have people interested in X show them this ad".
[+] [-] vlunkr|3 years ago|reply
Also the number of bots has exploded, that must account for some of the searches.
[+] [-] upupandup|3 years ago|reply
I can't take a browser serious when there are conflict of interset especially monetary ones in promoting it in public.
[+] [-] assemblylang|3 years ago|reply
Yes, its extremely annoying, and I do not trust anyone saying positive things about Brave or its other product offerings. Brave is a shady company that:
>puts profits over privacy
>impersonates well known influencers to sell their products without their knowledge
>constantly pushes their cryptocurrency, functionality completely unrelated to web browsing and of negative value to anyone caring about their privacy
>their search results appear to be based off of google, despite claiming an independent index. all of your queries may just be going to google anyways
>the browser frequently sends telemetry to their servers
>they have consistently added more spyware to the browser unless users en masse call them out, which only happens some of the time
I don't think for a second you are being downvoted by real hacker news users. Brave has created some sort of native marketing arm or something that drowns out any criticisms with vague positive comments like "I've been using brave search, more privacy and better search results than google!". Something is truly fishy about Brave, and I refuse to go anywhere near their products.
[+] [-] gnicholas|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] capableweb|3 years ago|reply
No, because I don't judge individual comments based on what handle is attached to it. If you make a shitty comment, it's a shitty comment no matter if you're pro/against cryptocurrencies. And if it's good, it's good, no matter previous stances.
[+] [-] indymike|3 years ago|reply
Sometimes it is, but in this case it's actually an hacker newsworthy innovation.
> Everytime I look at comments its the same handles who are also pro-crypto
I'm 100% not into crypto. I don't like it's environmental impact and I'm not sure it will hold value long term. That said, it is an area where a lot of really smart people are trying to solve big problems... and maybe something of great utility will emerge.
> I can't take a browser serious when there are conflict of interset especially monetary ones in promoting it in public
I'm not sure what you mean here. Brave makes money by doing something other than either asking for donations (Mozilla), advertising (Mozilla, Chrome) or selling your data to whoever (lots of smaller browser companies)? Brave's interest in Crypto is a little strange, but the have made a great product, they are actively innovating, and their browser is really a better chrome than the original.
[+] [-] soundnote|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mrweasel|3 years ago|reply
You could ask the same question in respect to something like VSCode, Github or Kubernetes. It's fine, just skip the news and comments about stuff you don't care about.
[+] [-] GoblinSlayer|3 years ago|reply
What browsers do you think suffer from that?
[+] [-] jacooper|3 years ago|reply
Its probably most of brave's users, as crypto is disabled by default.
[+] [-] dzdt|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zuminator|3 years ago|reply
I'm not a fan or user of Brave yet I don't consider a story every other day or so to be excessive.
[+] [-] stjohnswarts|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arberx|3 years ago|reply
Excited to see it grow and improve!
[+] [-] SllX|3 years ago|reply
That’s quite an endorsement. I went ahead and added Brave Search to xSearch (an iPhone/iPad Safari extension that gives you keyword SE selection) to give it the college try.
[+] [-] mrpf1ster|3 years ago|reply
Recently however I have been using Kagi and I think I have found the one search engine that is better than google.
It has been great in every query, allows a ton of customization of ranking, and the people behind it make the Orion browser as well which has been my main driver.
https://kagi.com
[+] [-] skinnymuch|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] boulos|3 years ago|reply
I wish companies wouldn't try to make something seem big by using "billions". It took me billions of nanoseconds to write this comment...
[+] [-] ahmadmijot|3 years ago|reply
Now I only switch to Google Search once in a while.
[+] [-] heresaPizza|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] guessbest|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jppope|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Daunk|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] silverPoodle|3 years ago|reply
DuckDuckGo, Qwant and similar search engines never give me so good results.
[+] [-] onelovetwo|3 years ago|reply
It's their deep financial ties to Microsoft thats worrying. And it seems they're willing to turn their back on privacy when Microsoft asks.
[+] [-] OJFord|3 years ago|reply
Is it me or does the description not match the bullet? To me 'transparency' would be 'we detail on this page exactly how we bias/filter/downrank results (except where legally required not to)'.
Second point somewhat implicit in the first: how can a search engine be said not to bias/filter/downrank results? That's the whole job? I think what they mean is they have some generic algorithm, and there's no special casing going on to further political or social ideals etc.?
Circling back to the first - I think you can even do that (if you want) and claim transparency, you just have to say 'we aggressively downrank anything to do with XY rights' or whatever, and it might not be what everyone wants but it will be transparent?
[+] [-] elektor|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mhh__|3 years ago|reply
When I try brave I estimate it's one impedence-mismatch a day. Not a bad product but reports of googles demise are overstated.
[+] [-] zionic|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tiffanyh|3 years ago|reply
As a comparison, DDG did 35B queries last year.
https://duckduckgo.com/traffic
[+] [-] simonebrunozzi|3 years ago|reply
[0]: https://skai.io/monday-morning-metrics-daily-searches-on-goo...!
[+] [-] nicodjimenez|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] ta8645|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fritigern|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stuckinhell|3 years ago|reply
This feature seems pretty incredible for searching specific domains. I'm excited for it.