The Google Exodus That Wasn't
If there's any exodus at all, it's very slow
We're hardly "Fans" or "Fanboys" or "Fangirls" of Google. We routinely criticise the company for many things. Google is the G in GAFAM.
On a personal level, Google tried to recruit me for technical roles in the distant past (at least thrice, going 2 decades back), but that was before I became very outspoken about the company*. I never applied for a job there. I never will.
Having said that, fictional things or bogus claims or fantasy (false narrative at the very least) say that many people quit using Google Search. We need to debunk this. Because it's outright false.
First of all, it's true that Google results (in the search "disservice" of Google) are getting worse. Everyone seems to agree on it and we made about a handful of long videos about this subject in past years. Some were as lengthy as half an hour. This past week or so we saw several bloggers bemoaning the quality and relevance of results, and as recently as an hour ago Ryan said so in IRC.
This week, however, I saw a false assertion that many people leave Google as a search engine. Well, first of all, over time more and more people get connected and go "online" (to many, the first such experience is on some "smart" "phone"). For them, it's typically an Android phone wired or configured to go to everything Google (by default). The OEM agreements with Google typically mandate some default proprietary "apps" and it would cost more (or remove "subsidies") if a non-Google search engine gets used.
Judging by data we see in Web surveys, LLMs had no impact or hardly made a dent on the side of Google. The LLM hype started in 2022 and almost 3 years later Google is still dominant in search. "Google" is a dictionary word (and trademark) that is synonymous with search.
In IRC we're discussing what to use instead of Google. One growing "school of thought" is, use something like a Web directory or bookmarks. Search engines exist to serve their masters, not their users. █
_____
* I'm not a "hater", I just see Google for what it is... a sponsor of online mobsters, whose lawyer now receives Microsoft money to harass my wife and I. Google hired many Microsofters - more than any other company in fact.