I feel like there are probably some ad based search engines which are privacy and service oriented, but in general even for those there remains a misalignment problem. Hence if I don’t want to be a product now or in the future, what good search engines are there that I can pay for?
Kagi is my absolute favorite.
Sounding off as another kagi user. It’s great. If the company doesn’t do anything extra stupid or come out pro-techno fascist they’ll have my business for life.
If for no other reason than to decrease my digital footprint, get rid of ads, and pay billionaires less.
Ok cool I saw this one— is it really like the old internet?
Like others have said, it’s not “old internet” per se, but they are big proponents of the “small web”; that is, independently-run, focused sites with good content and a purpose other than ad clicks. In that sense, it reflects what made the old internet good.
I use Kagi. It’s not especially like the Internet at some long-ago date, other than maybe than in that they run a search engine for Usenet archives.
I use Kagi for privacy reasons. They run a no-log, no-profile, no-ads setup, which is what I’d been wanting for some time.
If you’re looking for some kind of retro Internet experience, maybe grab a gopher client and look at gopher servers, or an IRC client, telnet to a MUD, use an FTP client to connect to an FTP server. All of those still have active servers and haven’t changed much, so it’ll still give a comparable feel.
I also recommend Kagi. I wouldn’t say it’s like the “old internet” but it works and it has amazing features that every search engine should have.