The 2019 rule book is intended to make the game of golf easier and encourages a faster pace of play. There's probably one obvious timing difference - instead of 5 minutes to search for a ball (the timer starts when you get to the area where you believe the ball to be), you're now down to 3. That's 180 seconds people. Are you going to carry a stopwatch to measure it? It's probably not a bad idea if "speed of play" continues to be a gripe in the clubhouse after 9 holes in the Ruggles Evening Golf League. Cell phones (put them on mute or vibrate) would do the trick.
The big point here is that 3 minutes is going to be an adjustment - search quickly my friends.
If after 3 minutes you can't find your ball, you may either go back to the point where your last stroke was made, or employ the new local REGL rule and come to an agreement with your opponent where the ball should have been found, take a one-stroke penalty and drop a ball within 2 club lengths of that spot (no closer to the hole).
Editorial note: I don't know if you caught these two examples, but I don't think a few of our professional brethren are too happy with the 2-minute reduction in search time. The first was Dustin Johnson losing a ball in the ice plants near the 4th hole of Pebble Beach. Dustin had quite a few people looking for his ball, but the search was called off after 3 minutes. Could he have found the ball in another 2? Maybe.... The second example happened on Thursday at the Open Championship to local hero Graham McDowell on what I think was his 17th hole of the day when he was playing great golf. Ball was searched for and found after.... 3 minutes and 12 seconds. There is no "Canton Rule" at the Open Championship. Even though Graham found his ball, all he could do was put it in his pocket and hike back to his previous place of play. He said after the round that all of the wind was taken out of his sails after a really good round because of the penalty. Could 3 minutes be too short? It's a very good question....