Privacy

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Ecosia and Qwant team up to launch an independent search index, challenging Google & Bing (techcrunch.com)

submitted 1 day ago by Zerush@lemmy.ml to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

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Ecosia, the tree-planting search engine from Berlin, and Qwant, France's privacy-focused search provider, announced a joint venture in November 2024 to develop their own European search index[^5][^6]. The partnership aims to reduce their dependence on Microsoft's Bing APIs, which both companies currently rely on for search results[^6].

The new venture, called European Search Perspective (EUP), is structured as a 50-50 ownership split between Ecosia and Qwant[^6]. Qwant's engineering team and existing search index development will transfer to EUP, with Qwant CEO Olivier Abecassis leading the joint venture[^6].

"The door is open and we are ready to talk to anyone," said Abecassis, while noting they want to "move as fast as possible" with their existing shareholders' support[^6]. The index will begin serving France-based search traffic for both engines by Q1 2025, expanding to cover "a significant portion" of German traffic by end of 2025[^6].

Rising API costs are a key motivator, following Microsoft's massive price hike for Bing's search APIs in 2023[^6]. However, neither company plans to completely stop using Bing or Google, instead aiming to diversify their technical foundation as generative AI takes a more central role in search[^6].

[^6]: TechCrunch - Ecosia and Qwant, two European search engines, join forces on an index to shrink reliance on Big Tech

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[–] OminousOrange@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

No need to apologize, but it's good to be aware of the policies of various applications you use and promote.

I use perplexity occasionally myself, aware of the above, so I only do more general searches with it.

I have a self-hosted Perplexica instance I use for anything more sensitive.

[–] deadcatbounce@reddthat.com 2 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

There was a need to apologise; I was very wrong in context. So there! 😜 (I don't see the point in maintaining a position which is entirely shown to be fatally flawed.)

Thank-you for pointing to Perplexica. When I subscribed (for a year), Perplexity - unlike ChatGPT -was alone in giving references so I could avoid citing rubbish by checking unless I knew them; now they all cite. I won't be resubscribing and to have you refer this is really helpful. 😁

Thank-you.