[HN Gopher] Kagi Update: AI Image Filter for Search Results
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Kagi Update: AI Image Filter for Search Results
Author : lkellar
Score : 215 points
Date : 2024-10-17 20:02 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (help.kagi.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (help.kagi.com)
| jsheard wrote:
| For those who haven't jumped ship to Kagi, there's a uBlacklist
| feed which strips out most big sites dedicated to AI images, with
| an optional extra "nuclear" feed which also knocks out sites that
| aren't strictly dedicated to AI images but do have a very large
| proportion of them.
|
| https://github.com/laylavish/uBlockOrigin-HUGE-AI-Blocklist
| EA-3167 wrote:
| Still, give Kagi a chance. I don't work for them, I don't have
| friends who work for them, I'm just a guy who uses Kagi and
| will never look back. It isn't expensive and it's SO worth it.
| mattbaker wrote:
| Same, best digital product I've spent money on in a long
| time. It's an improvement over Google, and well worth the
| price.
| stavros wrote:
| I tried it for two months and it was good, but not that
| much better that I'd spend $10/mo on it. The results were
| basically about the same as DDG. I can't really relate to
| all the praise I see about it.
|
| However, I do have to say that, when I was looking for a
| very specific post, I spent around twenty minutes on Google
| and DDG and they came back with trash, whereas Kagi found
| it right away. In that one instance it was, indeed,
| fantastic.
| digging wrote:
| I don't feel I have enough ground truth to know how good
| Kagi's search is in absolute terms (eg. there are plenty
| of searches where I still just "fail to find" and I don't
| know if it's my fault or theirs), I just know that I get
| less "junk" results with it than with DDG by far. With
| the additional ability to customize results and filters,
| I'd say it's a _good_ product and it 's worth a small
| subscription fee.
|
| The quality of all free search is just _bad_. Kagi, even
| when it fails, is basically the difference between me
| looking for something or just giving up and deciding it
| 's not worthwhile. Kagi's not magic-tier like early
| Google was - it's basically just the _only_ modern web
| search engine.
| mzhaase wrote:
| Been using it for a week and it is so nice to not have to
| your results cluttered by marketing bs. I'm faster at work as
| well because I find actually relevant informational.
| dawnerd wrote:
| Switched about ten months ago and it's been so good I forget
| it's even not Google sometimes.
| stavros wrote:
| If you forget it's not Google, I don't want to sign up. I
| want something that reminds me all the time that it's not
| Google, mainly by its ability to actually find the things I
| search for.
| worldsayshi wrote:
| I suppose what they mean is that it's easy to forget that
| it isn't Google from ten years ago when Google was good?
| dawnerd wrote:
| Exactly. Going to real Google now is like ?? How did I
| use this before?
| mordae wrote:
| It's very much not Google and you find things faster.
| They have 100 free searches for you to try.
| genghisjahn wrote:
| Same. I'm so used to it now that when I see a google search
| page I think "woah, what is this? Oh. Yeah. Bleh".
| MOARDONGZPLZ wrote:
| The only thing that reminds me it's not Google is when I
| search for a place I don't get a good map that then allows
| me to route to the place. Still use Google for that.
| ajb wrote:
| For me there are plusses and minuses. It doesn't push ads,
| but it doesn't seem quite so good at picking out phrases in
| the query. So I will search for something and then have to
| go back and quote the phrases
| ibejoeb wrote:
| I don't work there or know anyone who does either, but I wish
| I did. Kagi is great.
|
| It is _kinda_ expensive, but the quality is very high and I
| search all day long. It 's definitely worth it.
| koutsie wrote:
| [delayed]
| wenc wrote:
| I was a paid Kagi user.
|
| It's one of those tools where I have to say, "it doesn't fit
| me but you're doing something good in the world so keep
| going."
|
| I don't do the kind of searches where Kagi is a lot better
| than Google (I bet folks here do).
|
| On the searches I do want to do, i.e steaming movies, local
| business and map related, Kagi is not yet strong at. I kept
| having to !g.
|
| So I'm back to Google which I find fits me better.
|
| But I'm glad Kagi exists.
| aDyslecticCrow wrote:
| This feature may single-handedly make me pay for Kagi rather than
| using the free trial searches. Looking for drawing references is
| infuriating these days with the amount of AI.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| For Google Images I've had success with filtering by date to
| exclude everything posted since about 2023.
|
| That said this feature might still be useful, especially if
| it's extended to normal search results for sites with AI-
| generated articles etc.
| doe_eyes wrote:
| This works wonderfully, but is obviously not sustainable.
| It's not just that you miss out on newer content, but content
| rot progresses pretty quickly. Old Reddit accounts are
| deleted or blocked, Flickr users stop paying their
| subscription fees, etc.
|
| There are so many photobucket.com URLs buried in old forum
| posts that no longer work...
| ziddoap wrote:
| Interesting, another battlefront for AI vs. AI.
|
| Probably will be well-liked overall by Kagi customers, I'm sure.
| I'd be a bit concerned about false positives, but I suppose the
| stakes are pretty low compared to other similar situations (e.g.
| using AI to detect AI-generated essays in University), so there's
| not much of a concern.
|
| Is there any mechanism to provide feedback for false positives?
| internet101010 wrote:
| > Is there any mechanism to provide feedback for false
| positives?
|
| I think this could possibly be nice reward program, provided
| guardrails are in place to prevent abuse.
| Etheryte wrote:
| This is a solid idea, but I wish they addressed the elephant in
| the room -- image search is by far the weakest part of Kagi. For
| a considerable portion of queries, a large part of the results
| isn't relevant. If you use filters, they're often ignored or
| don't apply correctly. Many images are tangentially related at
| best. The list goes on. I've been paying for Kagi for a long
| while, yet I've seen nearly no improvements on this front. Image
| search is one part of their product where I often go to Google or
| other options because what Kagi does there just doesn't cut it.
| yzydserd wrote:
| I agree. I've often wondered, what could be the possible reason
| given Kagi is using google APIs behind the scenes?
| freediver wrote:
| Do you have any example to share? (we do not hear this
| feedback frequently so want to make sure we address it,
| thanks!)
| AndroTux wrote:
| It's hard to put it into solid feedback and examples,
| because it is highly subjective. But I also find the image
| results from Kagi lacking, while I really enjoy the text
| based results. Especially for more specific queries, the
| image search just doesn't hold up.
|
| I just tried generating an example. Take the query
| "screenshot nero burning rom windows xp" - of the first 10
| images, only 6 are screenshots of the program on Kagi. On
| Google, it's a solid 10/10.
|
| Of course it's hard to take just one example, but it
| reflects the general feeling I have when using the image
| search quite well. The results aren't necessarily terrible,
| it's just that they aren't as relevant as Google's.
| freediver wrote:
| I see both Kagi and Google have 9/10 screenshots of Nero.
|
| To make it easier for you to report any discrepancies I
| created a bug report with screenshots of what I see.
|
| https://kagifeedback.org/d/5073-investigate-image-search-
| res...
| freediver wrote:
| Would you mind being specific and posting a search quality
| issue with a concrete example(s) to kagifeedback.org? We are
| keen to address the issues you are seeing.
| Etheryte wrote:
| I actually did post on your feedback site nearly a year ago,
| still no feedback or response on it so far [0]. It's been
| marked as under review, so it must be one thorough review
| process.
|
| [0] https://kagifeedback.org/d/2565-image-search-doesnt-
| respect-...
| freediver wrote:
| Thanks, replied in the thread.
| Etheryte wrote:
| That's kind of you, but if you have to resort to HN
| comments as your feedback system, then your existing
| feedback system doesn't really work, does it?
| digging wrote:
| I do not think this is a case of that happening like with
| other big tech names treating customers like shit until
| they make it onto HN. Vlad's _super_ active (like, is he
| ok?) on the Orion browser bugs /feedback forums so I have
| to assume the same is true of Kagi, their actual money
| maker. Sometimes things fall through the cracks. One data
| point isn't a trend.
| Topgamer7 wrote:
| I'm a subscriber. But I don't feel like creating a signup for
| kagifeedback.
|
| https://kagi.com/images?q=https%3A%2F%2Fs3.amazonaws.com%2Fp.
| ..
|
| Lets use this as an example. I would personally like to have
| a list of exact results. Separately - a list of similar
| images would maybe be nice. But tbh, 99.99% of the time with
| reverse image search, I am trying to play detective, not find
| similar images. I am usually looking to see the first,
| original source of something. Or maybe other places I can
| find this image.
|
| I will point out that detective stuff like this is crucial to
| try to prevent being catfished, or phished. I am not ignorant
| that it is also a concern for those who don't want to be
| found, for privacy or safety reasons; however some threat
| actor could just find a less public reverse image search I'm
| sure.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| > I'm a subscriber. But I don't feel like creating a signup
| for kagifeedback.
|
| It's a separate login? That's really weird, isn't it?
| tensor wrote:
| Not really. It's not that uncommon for a
| support/forum/feedback site to use a separate account. It
| just means that they didn't have time, didn't want to
| spend the money, or couldn't link the support software to
| their main user account system.
| freediver wrote:
| > It just means that they didn't have time,
|
| That's it!
| huesatbri wrote:
| Yandex image search is really good.
| 42lux wrote:
| Probably the best tbh
| dingnuts wrote:
| Well, your anecdote is completely contrary to mine. Image
| search has always worked great for me and it's easier to save
| the image because Kagi doesn't play games with the source of
| the image like Google Images does.
|
| It's Google Images that I find unusable.
| dmonitor wrote:
| Image search is the one area in Kagi that I've seen the most
| improvement over the past year. When I first subscribed, I'd
| often switch to Google to find what I was looking for. Nowadays
| it works exactly as I intend.
| louthy wrote:
| Been using Kagi for a good year or more now and am very happy,
| but this feels like a real level-up.
|
| This is exactly the kind of thing I want to be paying for. It
| doesn't even matter if it's not 100% accurate (I don't think it
| ever could be without some serious processing), the commitment to
| down-ranking sites that have low quality content is the whole
| ball game for me.
| hmottestad wrote:
| Just don't search for "baby peacock". The AI filter is no match
| for the famous baby peacock, I say that because the AI pictures
| are actually now shown because they are part of articles
| discussing AI generated photos.
| iandanforth wrote:
| First thing I tried and was disappoint.
| UberFly wrote:
| Another nice Kagi feature that I eventually won't want to do
| without. I already can't imagine going back.
| lol768 wrote:
| In the example in the docs, they show someone marking an image
| that has slipped through the filter as one that's AI generated.
| But, it comes from Adobe Stock - and I think this really
| highlights the biggest weakness with how they've gone about
| implementing this. It's not looking at the images at all, it's
| looking at _where they come from_.
|
| The problem is that now that Pandora's box has been opened, all
| sorts of sites (incl. anywhere like social media that accepts
| user content) are going to have comingled AI-and-legitimate
| images that they host.
|
| This is a hard problem to solve.
| freediver wrote:
| It is a hard problem to solve and we just started solving it a
| week ago. There is lot more to be done on this front, but when
| there is will there is way.
| mimimi31 wrote:
| I tried the the linked example search for "baby cat" and it
| returned the same three AI cats you can see in their Google
| search comparison screenshot on the first page. None of them
| labeled as AI generated.
|
| Edit: When I explicitly choose to "Include" AI images from the
| toolbar option, they disappear. When I choose to "Exclude" them,
| they reappear. Still seems a bit buggy.
| ricardo81 wrote:
| Semi related +1 for mojeek powering their results. Kagi gets a
| lot of favour on HN, worth a nod to Mojeek for powering their
| organic results to an extent.
| pera wrote:
| wow just compare these two results:
|
| https://www.mojeek.com/search?q=baby+peacock&fmt=images
|
| https://www.google.com/search?q=baby+peacock&sclient=img&udm...
| RheingoldRiver wrote:
| hmm, I am not certain that I prefer the option without the
| source listed. For example, I might prefer an image from
| Wikipedia over another image. Or if I am searching for a map
| and the URL has the word 'historical' I would not choose that
| one. etc.
|
| It depends on what I am searching for and why I want to use
| it.
| ricardo81 wrote:
| If you look closer, Kagi uses Mojeek for organic results, not
| images
|
| I guess to me anyway, images/news etc is a sideshow to the
| wider web, as in a crawler/indexer and not a pretendy meta
| search.
| GaggiX wrote:
| >this feature relies on the website's reputation rather than
| analyzing individual images.
|
| Okay, this would not work for Reddit, where many of the AI-
| generated images come from, or any other site that allows user-
| generated content (unless the site is strictly AI-related).
| dmonitor wrote:
| Should go ahead and add Pinterest and Adobe stock images to the
| list of "mostly AI" image providers
| disqard wrote:
| Dunno if vlad can see this, but
|
| https://kagi.com/images?q=baby+peacock
|
| ...shows _that_ infamous AI-generated peacock image multiple
| times on the first row of results.
|
| Merely filtering out websites that tend to have lots of AI images
| does not prevent this failure case, since (for example):
|
| https://birdfact.com/articles/baby-peacocks
|
| has the fake image in there, as an example of "What does a baby
| peacock not look like?"
|
| As Emily Bender has correctly pointed out, AI images are like an
| oil spill, and the cleanup (if such a thing is even feasible)
| will be challenging:
|
| https://medium.com/@emilymenonbender/cleaning-up-a-baby-peac...
|
| (edited to add that I'm a paying Kagi customer, and this failure
| case isn't a ding against my overall impression of what Kagi is,
| and I'll continue using it)
| stavros wrote:
| What's that about a fake peacock? This is the first I'm hearing
| of it.
| louthy wrote:
| > What's that
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41767648
| freediver wrote:
| I see that a few AI images get through. That is OK - we still
| filter almost 30 AI images correctly (scroll to the bottom of
| search results to see them all). Also overall the results seem
| to be of higher quality than on other search engines.
|
| For something that we just started working on a week ago and
| knowing this is just the first iteration of the feature - I
| think we are doing good overall. When there is will, there will
| be a way. And there is plenty of will on our end to stop this
| thing.
| neilv wrote:
| > _By default, Kagi Image Search downranks images from websites
| with a high proportion of AI-generated content._
|
| Is this incentive for sites to avoid/discourage AI-generated
| images, to avoid that hurting search rankings?
| llamaimperative wrote:
| That's definitely the incentive it produces but given Kagi's
| market share, I imagine it will have pretty much zero effect on
| sites' behavior. It's much more (and quite valuable) a browser-
| side improvement.
| throwaway19972 wrote:
| Great! Now let's apply this to ads and notifications!
| amelius wrote:
| Can't we demand (+) that AI generated images get a watermark that
| designates it as such?
|
| (+) By frowning really hard at people who don't follow this rule?
|
| Because, don't defecate where you eat.
| freediver wrote:
| It would be actually useful to mandate AI-generated images to
| include identifying metadata.
| nox101 wrote:
| So that's nice for people that don't want AI images. In the other
| hand, I actually want the opposite. I want AI images ranked
| higher. They're more likely to be usable (CC-.., PD, etc)
| freediver wrote:
| Would you want to search for them though? Or ability to
| generate them yourself easily?
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