Why pay for a search engine

I would convert, but price is too high for me personally.

I'd be willing to pay up to 3$ a month for my searches, but also per-use.

If I make 0 searches, why do I need to pay?

A replacement for Google that is to survive should really convince and be super cheap, it's so easy to ignore sponsored search results (for now).

> If I make 0 searches, why do I need to pay? Do you ever have months in which you don’t use a search engine at all? If so you might just not be the target audience.

You either pay a flat fee, or you have to deal with the added baggage of considering that each search costs you a very real half a cent or whatever.

Would you use your search engine more if every search query were an implicit microtransaction? Would you use it more or less if you had to consider that your first search of the month cost $3, or if it's the last day of the month and you need to search for something but you have to wait to not incur a full month's fee.

This is one of those arguments that sounds reasonable but isn't. Nothing but a flat fee structure makes sense for something you'll be doing hundreds if not thousands of times a month. And let's be real: if you're the kind of person who could go a full month with no web searches, you don't want or need what Kagi is offering.

I think you could bundle online search and LLM, offline (personsal) search and LLM and it would make 10-20 bucks a month attractive. Why just do internet search. Be my search for everything!

I think it should be free or cheaper for people who genuinely cant afford it to give the equity of access that Google does.

Well yes but it's kinda crappy that you do. Can easily imagine an alternate reality where laws are more pro-consumer such that it's illegal to charge someone for a service in a month that they don't use it.

> replacement for Google that is to survive should really convince and be super cheap

The market for most is met with ads. It's why streaming services are adding ad tiers and JCPenney doing "away with constant sales and coupons, opting instead for everyday low prices" failed [1]. That's most consumers. It's almost all non-premium consumers. That's good fodder for Google and whatever LLM garbage replaces them.

Paraphrasing Scott Galloway, advertising is a tax on the stupid and the poor. I wish something like Kagi got public funding. But we have better priorities than taking ads out of search. So for the time being, you get one product for the wealthy and savvy and another, that's just good enough, for everyone else.

[1] https://excelsiorcapital.substack.com/p/jc-penneys-lost-barg...

> Can easily imagine an alternate reality where laws are more pro-consumer such that it's illegal to charge someone for a service in a month that they don't use it

Didn't use my vacation home this month, skipping the mortgage payments!

Top tier Kagi subscription allows you to tack a '?' onto the end of search and an LLM of your choosing will reply FYI.

https://files.horizon.pics/dfcedf80-2b55-422e-9960-42d730532...

Almost everyone is paying for their electricity based on usage, and yet people don't seem to think "this will cost me a dollar" when turning on the washing machine (unless really short on money). I think usage-based SaaS subscriptions could make sense from user's perspective, they are just too uncommon right now.

> or you have to deal with the added baggage of considering that each search costs you a very real half a cent or whatever.

And one way to "deal with" that is get used to it and forget about it unless you get some surprise hit (which can be avoided with a cap). But you'll have a warm glow feel that it's "fair"

It's not like this is some novel issue average people have never had exposure to (eg, utilities)

The comparison with a house does not work, it relies on a misapplication of the word "use". In the context of a house, "use" refers to ownership. You receive the benefits (use) of ownership regardless of your presence. You basically pay for the inability for others to live on the property.

That's not at all the same.