Duckduckgo is great. I can appreciate a search engine which seeks to return accurate and relevant results based on the user's search queries. That is how a search engine works, that's the whole point. A search engine which *doesn't* use an algorithm to sort the most accurate results at the top will never see much use. The controversy is way overblown.
Aside from a company trying to get good PR points with "look how much we care, look how good we're doing!" which is always a bit dubious, but I have better things to spend my time worrying about.