Do we need another iCyclopedia?

From Early days, man has tried to collect and record information and put it in an easy to read volume set to sell to the masses for profit. Well, maybe not like that, but it’s turned into a business. Since the inception of the internet, an online encyclopedia has been attempted and with Wikipedia, some will say it’s a great resource for free. Now Google wants in on it by creating their own online knowledge base called “Knol”. Is this really a good idea or should we focus efforts on what is out there already?

Yeah, I Remember the Encyclopedia Britannica kid? This was an ad back in the early 90’s featuring a kid and an announcer that promoted the multi-volume Encyclopedia Britannica. The kid, Donavan Freberg, and the announcer, his dad – Stan Freberg were the duo that promoted this volume library.

The Encyclopedia has been around since 560 CE (Common Era, also known as AD) when Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator (a.k.a. Cassiodorus) wrote the first Christian Encyclopedia. Since then, the collection of information in a volume set has been redone and improved upon throughout time. The first part of the Encyclopedia Britannica was issued in 1768 and spanned 3 years to complete. It later became the dominant volume reference in Encyclopedias.

An electronic reference started around 1993 called “Interpedia”. It was free and open for people to contribute. Another online references like “Everything2”, “Open Site” and “GNUPedia” were also created for web information, but soon these ideas went to the wayside.

While this was happening, companies like World Book and the aforementioned Encyclopedia Britannica began posting their content online. However, both of these items are Pay content sites. Of course you need money to create and maintain content. There are free sites and Hybrids (part free, part pay) out on the internet such as HighBeam Encyclopedia and Microsoft Encarta. However, no other site seemed to impact as hard as Wikipedia.

Founded in 2001, Wikipedia has become the strongest free reference site out on the internet. Using the population not only as the creators, but also the editors, the Free Encyclopedia has seemed to keep as current as possible. There have been times information was incorrect but it was corrected quickly and easily by public voice. And the content can be as current as today.

 Now Google is entering into this market with “Knol”. The main difference is that the Author will be credited for the work as much as the site. The author will also be responsible for maintaining the content of the page. This turns Open Collaboration into a possible content nightmare. Whereas a Wikipedia topic can be edited by a number of people quickly and easily, Knol will run on a submission system to the author. This might take said author a day, a week or even a month to update. I would assume that Google would replace a page that gave wrong information that wasn’t corrected in a specific time period. That is still a lot of moderation.

So it might be safe to say that Googles’ Knol is more geared like About.com – a “Guide” controls the content of the subject they administer. They keep the content up to date and field any questions. Difference is the guides get paid for their time spent.

With as many different references out there, why would Google want to commit time and money to this project - especially since Wikipedia is a non-profit organization? Wouldn’t it be better time spent to help grow Wikipedia?

This may become a good case of Information over-share - too many places to insert the same content. Sometimes it’s good – two people with slightly different views – but most times it’s the same exact thing.

It wouldn’t be surprising if a year or two down the road we see news stories of one site claiming the information on the other site was taken verbatim from their pages. With Wiki, plagiarism has already been an issue – in 2006, out of the 12,000 articles researched by Daniel Brandt, 142 were found to be plagiarized work. George Orwel was accused of using five paragraphs of a 2005 Wiki article.

Who will win on the search? Will Knol get a search page advantage on Google’s search site? What about on other search engines?

It’s very possible Google will pay search sites to put their content on top. It will be interesting to see if a year from now, when I type in “Wikipedia” in my search box if I will get a Wiki pages first or a knol page. Right now, if you search “Knol”, you will get a Wikipedia site. Gotta love the irony.

The bottom line is content. We should focus on one site to be the most up to date and accurate in the information it contains. Getting behind a non-profit organization or a company controlled group has both advantages and disadvantages. Maybe you just want to buy the 30 volume set and get the online companion with it. It’s really up to the users to let us know what will be around ten years from now.

BTW – the majority of this article was researched on Wikipedia. I found the content using Google. The kid in the Britannica ads, Donavan Freberg, has his own myspace page at  http://www.myspace.com/donavanfreberg. He has a blog, too – but since that is Not Safe for Work content, we will leave that part for your personal searching.