DuckDuckGo
Privacy-marketed search with lighter tracking; still a business that must fund results and experiments over time.
User surplus Stage 1
The product is genuinely good for users; growth and goodwill are the priority.
DuckDuckGo’s pitch is user-aligned: less profiling on the SERP, straightforward settings. Trade-offs include smaller index quirks and revenue from ads that aren’t personalized the same way—not utopia, but the default stance still skews toward user surplus versus surveillance maximization. Stage 1 with eyes open about sustainability.
