Most people are not even using the integrated search functions. Look at selfhosted groups here in Lemmy. Most people are starting a new thread asking for the same thing instead of using the search. Best example would be "note taking app"
500x the same answers, but everytime someone starts a new thread because they want to ask about "note taking app with fearure x" They are just too lazy to test a few apps themselves 🙄
It seems that only a few people are even reading through the awesome-selfhosted list
If those 2 easy things are not used, a search engine for better filtering is not used too imo 🤔