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Wikipedia founder says he can best Google and Yahoo

Wikia Inc., the company founded by Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales, formally announced that it will be collaborating on an Internet search engine project to rival that of Google's and Yahoo's own search engine. Unofficial announcements that Wikia would enter the search engine market surfaced late last year. 

According to Wikia Inc. founder Jimmy Wales, there's nothing really special about how Google and Yahoo perform searches, and that there is a misconception about a company like Google. "The idea that Google has some edge because they've got super-duper rocket scientists may be a little antiquated now," said Wales.

Responsible for the direction and growth of Wikipedia, Wales has transformed the site from merely a technological demonstration tool to something that is now one of the most popular online destinations. Wales said he believes that a collection of people working as a community will be able to push search engine technology faster and further than a traditional company. Similar to the way that the online community transformed Wikipedia, Wales hopes that this movement can be applied to search.

According to Wales, Wikia Inc. hopes to take as much as five percent of the search engine market, though no target date was given as to when the goal would be achieved. Wales did mention however, that his company received a total of $4 million from investors and a "very large investment" from Amazon.com. Wales declined to comment on what kind of stake Amazon had in Wikia Inc.

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Interesting.
By danskmacabre on 3/9/2007 5:58:11 AM , Rating: 1
This sounds dead interesting.
But without more information, it's hard to comment on the article.




RE: Interesting.
By ThisSpaceForRent on 3/9/2007 9:03:55 AM , Rating: 2
If they build the entire thing open source ala Wikipedia that would be an interesting undertaking. Of course Google and Yahoo would probably do all they could to sabotage it, hehe. One thing I would hate to see is advertising dollars becoming an annoying presence on a Wikia search engine. I like the clean look of Wikipedia (sans ads), and ads would just be an annoying distraction.

Off topic, I heart Wikipedia.


RE: Interesting.
By MustaineC on 3/9/2007 9:35:41 AM , Rating: 5
First they need to improve the search engine they use in Wikipedia. Sometimes if you make a little spelling mistake you'll go nowhere.

For instance, try to find "Fidel Castre" (should be Castro) in Wikipedia, and then try to find it in Google.


RE: Interesting.
By cochy on 3/9/2007 1:34:01 PM , Rating: 2
Yes exactly. I keep thinking that Wikipedia needs to use a Google search-engine lol


RE: Interesting.
By jtesoro on 3/10/2007 5:43:45 AM , Rating: 2
I just use Google to get to Wikipedia. I simply search using Google and click on the Wikipedia entry that comes up. Sometimes I force it by entering "wikipedia fidel castro" (for example) in the google search box, and that usually works very well


RE: Interesting.
By Micronite on 3/11/2007 3:47:23 PM , Rating: 2
Google tip:
This will always find the wiki entry. If you're looking for "nuclear fusion" then search with:
"nuclear fusion" site:wikipedia.org
This will bring up only hits from wikipedia.org


RE: Interesting.
By Oregonian2 on 3/9/2007 3:28:40 PM , Rating: 2
I wonder how all of this (including the needed server farms and massive network bandwidth) would be financed? If not by ads, by donations?
Selling of Wiki T-shirts?


RE: Interesting.
By PWNettle on 3/9/2007 4:02:22 PM , Rating: 2
I love Wikipedia as it is - I don't think I'd continue to use it as much if it was as ad-spammed a so many other resources. Not that this seemingly has anything to do with the topic.

I'm also skeptical about wiki-anything competing with Google for searching. Google is pretty impressive.

Open source/community whatever is all well and good, but I've yet to ever be impressed with the speed of delivery, speed of change, responsiveness, or any other developmental aspect of anything open-source-related. If they go that route, I just don't see them competing in whatever it is they're competing for (open source to compete for ad dollars and web-based apps? it's not like we pay to search so...eh..nevermind...I'm beyond confused now).


RE: Interesting.
By Hare on 3/12/2007 1:43:37 PM , Rating: 2
Open source can also be commercial! Just because you include the whole world in your developement team doesn't make things slow. Open Source is a lot more than "free software".


Everyone wants to take a shot at Google
By Scorpion on 3/9/2007 1:07:44 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Wales said he believes that a collection of people working as a community will be able to push search engine technology faster and further than a traditional company. Similar to the way that the online community transformed Wikipedia, Wales hopes that this movement can be applied to search.


Immediately when I read this article I was wondering if they were going to go for a User-driven approach to searches, or a statistical-algorithmic based approach. I suppose this quote answers that...

I've always thought that a user driven search engine would have significant advantages over a computer-algorithmic based inference one. The algorithms are designed to deduce semantic and higher-level meanings from data similar to what humans seemingly do naturally all the time. So having humans doing that work only makes sense. The problems are what you pay people to do that, and how you overcome a "degeneracy" problem. If say you search for a term on google and you get a lot of unrelated search results and a few related one. If a community were around to determine how well results correlate to the search terms, over time the searches would be able to better infer what type of results the user desires. The problem however is degenerecy, or the inability for the search to be flexible to new results. Commonly desirable results will be further pushed to the top of the list while the rest will be pushed the bottom. How many people search through 20 pages of google results trying to find a match to what you want? Not many I suspect. New results will have a hard time making their way up the ladder to be seen, further enforcing the top results. That is something they would have to address.

They may claim that google does not have uber rocket scientists, but I doubt that they've got any either. Wikipedia, based on Wiki technology that they didn't invent, is hardly anything revolutionary. They just took an existing technology, gave it a pretty face, and found a community willing to do all of the hard work for them.

I'm speculating on how their technology will work based on my experience with Wikipedia and their related sites. They could do something better, or this could just be another exaggerated claim to best Google.




RE: Everyone wants to take a shot at Google
By jtesoro on 3/10/2007 5:49:43 AM , Rating: 2
On the rocket scientist part of your comment, I think what the Wikipedia guy is trying to say is that you don't need Google-style rocket scientists to come out with a good product. His approach is to use the community to come up with it.


RE: Everyone wants to take a shot at Google
By alcalde on 3/10/2007 1:16:14 PM , Rating: 2
Is "the community" going to want to do the work for a presumably for-profit venture?


By jtesoro on 3/11/2007 4:58:14 AM , Rating: 2
I don't know, but what matters is the Wiki guys' opinion and not mine. If they think people will do it, they are free to try it out.


Wikia is a stupid name.
By Mitch101 on 3/9/2007 10:39:07 AM , Rating: 2
3 syllables and doesnt sound right in a sentence.

Drop the a and just make it Wiki that would work. Then they could use that old rap song.

Wiki Wiki Wiki or have Tweaki from Buck Rodgers do thier commercials.

Yup Im going for coffee now please feel free to recommend a good psycologist.




RE: Wikia is a stupid name.
By Puddleglum1 on 3/9/2007 11:35:27 AM , Rating: 3
You can say it fast and there are no repeating tones. Like Yahoo or Google.

Wikia sounds just as nice to me.

If you find Wales, you can treat him to coffee and he can probably explain what's wrong with you. =)


RE: Wikia is a stupid name.
By bhupissaran on 3/13/2007 6:25:46 AM , Rating: 1
well sure as hell, it sounds like "fuck 'em in a missionary position" to me.


hmmm
By juggalo0707 on 3/10/2007 11:18:59 PM , Rating: 2
I really like Wikipedia. But you can't take Google down a level. They are VERY strong now. You may think there just simple with a couple of nerds running the codes right. But they've been in the game Solid as a duck.




Holy shit
By bhupissaran on 3/13/2007 6:10:59 AM , Rating: 2
Oh man,
Is the post even real.
I mean is the CEO of Wikia speaking this shit.
"Wikia" sure is a stinking name...it's like someone shouting to fuck 'em in a missionary position.

"5 % " and no target date , now that calls for a bull whip ...
call cowboys from Bar T off of Texas and get this man owned.




My gosh...
By GI2K on 3/9/2007 12:46:40 PM , Rating: 1
If the current wiki search engine is a preview of the one that will come out then it will suck as hell.




Ugh...
By Souka on 3/9/2007 4:57:37 PM , Rating: 1
quote:
Wikia Inc. hopes to take as much as five percent of the search engine market, though no target date was given as to when the goal would be achieved


Wow.... 5%.... and no target date.

They must be following the Bush Iraq war plan......oh wait, they said 5%...that's too specific to be a Bush plan....




By crystal clear on 3/10/2007 1:52:16 AM , Rating: 1
"Wikipedia founder says he can best Google and Yahoo'

Sorry,but you cannot compete with them-they too powerful
for you.

Read this-

Quote-

NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - AT&T Inc. (T.N: Quote, Profile, Research)and Yahoo Inc. (YHOO.O: Quote, Profile, Research) are negotiating how they could expand a broadband promotion deal to cover mobile Internet services and advertising, a source familiar with the talks said on Friday.

Current discussions focus on a potential mobile phone deal with AT&T's mobile unit, Cingular, the largest U.S. cellphone company, where Yahoo would provide advertising, Web search and other services along the lines of the contract Yahoo struck late last year to act as exclusive provider of advertising for Vodafone mobile phone customers in Britain, the source said.

"It is pretty obvious that the next new thing is mobile services and advertising," the source said.

In a joint statement issued on Friday afternoon, AT&T and Yahoo said Yahoo also would be providing services on AT&T's Internet television service later this year.

http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUS...




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