[Search-l] CNET: Wikipedia co-founder wants open-source search engine

[Seth Finkelstein]

[Disclaimer - Forwarded, since it has additional commentary and information]
[Wikipedia/Wikia/Search confusion below are the writer's errors, not mine]

http://news.com.com/2100-1032_3-6180379.html

Wikipedia co-founder wants open-source search engine

By Michael Kanellos Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Published: April 30, 2007, 9:00 PM PDT

Does the world need open-source search tools? The people at Wikipedia
think so.

The folks behind the public encyclopedia have launched Wikia, a
project to develop a search engine, crawlers and other indexing tools
through a collaborative, open-source process.

Contributors will likely include graduate students as well large
companies that want to include search functionality in their products
but don't want to pay royalties to a search company, according to
Wikia CEO Gil Penchina. Another constituency will likely be smaller
search companies that don't have the time or money to do everything
required for a complete search service themselves.

"Everyone has to crawl the Web, but it costs a lot of money," Penchina
said. "There has been a lot of interest in academia for better tools."

The concept is being promoted largely by Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy
Wales and Jabber founder Jeremie Miller. The ultimate goal of the
project is to bring "absolute transparency, collaboration and human
intelligence to complement search algorithms," according to a press
release.

"Jeremie is a brilliant thinker and a natural fit to help
revolutionize the world of search," Wales said in a statement. "I
believe Internet search is currently broken and the way to fix it is
to build a community whose mission is to develop a search platform
that is open and totally transparent."

Not mentioned in the press release is the fact that Wikia is a
for-profit venture. The complete business plan has yet to be worked
out, but profits and revenue may be derived from advertising or
services, Penchina said. The intellectual property behind Wikia,
however, will be freely licensed under standard open-source
mechanisms.

-- 
Seth Finkelstein  Consulting Programmer  http://sethf.com/
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