From the article:
"I know for a fact that Wikipedia operates under a CC BY-SA 4.0 license, which explicitly states that if you’re going to use the data, you must give attribution. As far as search engines go, they can get away with it because linking back to a Wikipedia article on the same page as the search results is considered attribution.
But in the case of Brave, not only are they disregarding the license - they’re also charging money for the data and then giving third parties “rights” to that data."
System1. Here’s a discussion about it.
I still fluctuate between using Startpage and public SearXNG instances myself, but I have mixed feelings about Startpage.
Thanks for the links. It looks like they engaged, but it is a little waffley, and it doesn’t exactly explain why they purchased them and where they see the ROI. If they are investing capital, they would need a return to make it profitable. It didn’t touch of whether they were after ad space without data (non targetted which isn’t worth a lot less, but may guarantee real estate), or a paid for service where Startpage will generate it’s own profits from services. Without further clarification, it doesn’t sit comfortably.