I've bene trying out Bing as an alternative, just to see how they do things differently. And already I like the "we know better then you" behavior with a search term I used today:
db.view
Google just assumes I was stupid and shows me completely worthless stuff as the first results. Bing did similar, but with this at the very top:
We're including results for dbview. Do you want results only for db.view?
Now I will give credit for Google on the instant search though, as I could add a few additional key words and see the changes instantly, without having to hit return, wait, click, type, return, wait... Now if they would also just add in the "we changed your search for you, click here to really search for what you typed" consistently.