[OWW-SC] FYI: Wikia Search Engine Goes Live Today

[Bill F]

<comment>

FYI: I wanted to pass this along. article along.

This new search engine is still not here for OWW but I'll find out how it
will be released and pass on what I find. Hopefully the search engine will
become part of Wikipedia or at least available as an Open Source project we
can use for OWW.

>From the sound of it, every search is generating a new article. This means
that results from search can be treated just like other docs. In a way, the
equivalent of an RSS document is manufactured whenever a search is
performed. This is speculation on my part. I'll get a handle on it.

</comment>



Wikia Search Engine Goes Live Today Search Wikia, the widely awaited search
engine from Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales, is slated to make its official
debut today. Juan Carlos Perez, IDG News Service
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,141087-c,searchengines/article.html

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Search Wikia <http://www.wikia.com/>, the widely awaited search engine from
Wikipedia <http://www.pcworld.com/tags/Wikimedia+Foundation+Inc..html>founder
Jimmy Wales, is slated to make its official debut on Monday, with
the bet that an open-source, community-driven effort can disrupt and reshape
this Google <http://www.pcworld.com/tags/Google+Inc..html>-dominated market.

However, people who give the search engine a test drive on Monday shouldn't
expect a Google killer, because they will be looking at a project that is at
a very early stage and will need participation from volunteers to grow and
be refined, Wales said.

In that sense, Search Wikia is expected to develop in a similar fashion to
Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia written and edited by a community of
volunteer collaborators who have expanded it and improved it organically
over the years.

"Search Wikia is an extremely alpha project. It's a project to build a
search engine and not a full-fledged competitor to Google yet. We want to
make sure people understand that it's in its very early days," Wales said.

Still, Wales fully expects Search Wikia to eventually be a better
alternative to commercial search engines from the likes of Google,
Yahoo<http://www.pcworld.com/tags/Yahoo%21+Inc..html>,
Microsoft <http://www.pcworld.com/tags/Microsoft+Corporation.html>,
AOL<http://www.pcworld.com/tags/AOL+LLC.html>and
Ask.com <http://www.pcworld.com/tags/Ask.com.html>.

"I don't know how long it will take to reach industry-standard quality
search results, but I'd say at least two years," he said.
Volunteer

People interested in volunteering will find a variety of options at Search
Wikia, including working with the software to improve and extend it, as well
as suggesting pages for the index and evaluating and rating search results.

Those who register to participate in the project will join a social
networking environment where they can have a list of friends, upload photos,
build profiles and be notified of friends' actions.

Users of the search engine will be presented with what Wales calls a "mini
article" at the top of the results list. This can be a photo, a text
definition, an external link or whatever else has been determined is the
best answer to that particular query.

Below the "mini article" will be the list of results, picked from the Search
Wikia index, which on Monday will have anywhere between 50 million and 100
million Web pages. Wales concedes that number is small, but said it will
continue to grow over time.

Users will be able to rank the quality of individual search results, and
Search Wikia will factor in that feedback when solving future queries. "That
way, people will be able to influence the algorithmic search results," he
said.

Those who try to abuse the system for, say, search engine spamming purposes,
are bound to be quickly noticed by administrators and other community
members, and they will swiftly be blocked and banned, Wales said.
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