The only thing I thought was an error on the CEO’s part (not regarding his views, just the way he handled himself) was the long followup email when the blog author said he wasn’t interested in debating with him. That email should have been a blog post of its own if it was worth writing in the first place, imo.

About his views, though: I’m turned off by his lack of regard for user-supplied details as PII. For me to use a search engine that requires an account, and therefore associates all of my searches with me directly, I would need to be supremely confident that my information is in good hands. Otherwise, how am I better off than using any other search engine on the internet without an account?

I’m glad I read through this post, Kagi has been on my radar but I hadn’t looked into it enough to decide if I might have any interest. Seems like the answer is, at least for now: no.

Speak for yourself, I’ve been prepared to submit detailed bug reports before the process in place to do so turned me off.