[kwlug-disc] DuckDuckGo.com -- an alternate search engine

[unsolicited]

Ralph Janke wrote, On 07/27/2010 12:32 PM:
> I am not sure what the resistance against javascript in general is.

Because it is a hidden black box that history has demonstrated can 
have nefarious elements. 'Nefarious' meaning different things to 
different people. (See Khalid's note.)

So, everything gets painted with the same brush.

If it were only code in a downloaded program, like a program, it would 
come up, every page, with a disclaimer and user agreement along the 
lines of "Do you trust us that this page does nothing deleterious, 
yada, yada, yada." Most times, people would say no, but they don't 
have that option. Or, at least, not reasonably.

And if you don't agree, you usually don't get the value for which you 
went to the page in the first place. (Thus Khalid's graceful 
degradation comment.)

This is all compounded by search, wherein the only reason you go to a 
page is by way of a search result, only to find looking at the result 
it does not have what you are looking for, and since it doesn't you 
wouldn't otherwise have gone there, let alone agreed to the potential 
for nefariousness that you agreed to just in case the non-degraded 
content actually has what you were looking for.

FUD. And history shows that the I.T. receiving public isn't wrong to 
hold that view.

Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean you're wrong. And people 
can't tell which sites they're not wrong about, beforehand.