This reverts commit 84de643c04.
Users are using the search endpoint as public API even though it is
meant to be internal. Revert for now while we figure out the path
forward on providing a more stable API to end users.
This reduces chances of errors where consumers of strings mutate inputs
and reduces memory usage of the app.
Test suite passes now, but there may be some stuff left, so we will run
a few sites on a branch prior to merging
