(In the case that someone in Lemmy still use Google)

      • squeakycat@lemmy.ml
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        8 months ago

        That’s fair. Like the sibling comment says, it’s worth it for me. But not everyone has the ability to pay.

        • RGB3x3@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          Yeah, but $10 a month is a lot. And the $5 plan for only 300 searches a month goes by really fast if you have to do any kind of research for anything. Even for trying to figure out what brand of something to buy, you blow through those searches super quick.

              • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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                8 months ago

                Google’s ad search revenue amounted to 175 billion

                That includes way more than search:

                That “search and other” figure includes revenue generated on Google’s search properties, along with ads on other Google-owned properties like Gmail, Maps and the Google Play app store.

                I couldn’t find a reliable source for a breakdown, so I’ll use Microsoft Bing statistics instead:

                • $12.2B ad revenue in 2023
                • ~1.3 billion unique visitors globally as of March 2023
                • $9.66 Bing revenue per user

                That last number is really close to my $1/month figure.

                So something around $1/month range seems like a fair replacement for ad revenue for a search engine.

                • FutileRecipe@lemmy.world
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                  8 months ago

                  As you said, it’s hard to calculate an exact number. But if you think your search results are only worth $1/month, that’s up to you to determine. I know if I was an ad-broker or profiler, I’d pay more than $1/month/person as that’s valuable information, in my opinion. And Kagi is worth much more than that to me. Proton theorizes:

                  If Google Search market share is also 90% in the US, that’s over 274 million people using Google, and the company earns $393 per year from each of them.

                  Ref: https://proton.me/blog/what-is-your-data-worth

            • stewie3128@lemmy.ml
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              8 months ago

              They’ve said that it costs them 1.5 cents to answer a search query, so that dollar a month wouldn’t go very far. I probably incidentally run 40-50 searches a day between my devices… $10 is a value that works for me.

              I’ve been using Kagi as my default since June, and don’t plan on stopping anytime soon.

              • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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                8 months ago

                That sounds unlikely… But they’re a small search provider with a small customer base, so costs will be high maintaining all the infrastructure needed.

                As I linked elsewhere, Bing makes ~$10 per user per year. That’s really close to my $1/month figure. And that’s revenue, which doesn’t count advertiser acquisition costs and whatnot.

                I’m unwilling to pay $5/month for limited searches, but I’m willing to pay for search if it’s reasonable.

        • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          That doesn’t mean the price has to be the same as a fucking Netflix subscription.

          Which service uses more computation? Streaming HQ video to millions of people, or running a search engine. Keep in mind, search engines have existed since basically before the internet in some form or another…

          • stewie3128@lemmy.ml
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            8 months ago

            Well, it costs Kagi about 1.5 cents to answer a search query. Consider how many searches you use in a month to determine how much they’re making off you at $10/mo.

            I’m lucky enough to be in a position to be able to pay for products that I use, instead of relying on freemium, or ad-supported, or data-mined, or pirated products. That hasn’t always been the case for me, so I don’t judge anyone for making a different choice.

            • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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              8 months ago

              If they’re taking in less than 1000 searches of money for 3000 searches, the numbers still aren’t adding up. Someone is misinformed or the product still.