Wikipedia-based search engine to challenge Google

James Doran, Founder of Wikipedia plans search engine to rival Google, Times Online, December 23, 2006. Excerpt:

Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, the online encyclopaedia, is set to launch an internet search engine with amazon.com that he hopes will become a rival to Google and Yahoo!

Mr Wales has begun working on a search engine that exploits the same user-based technology as his open-access encyclopaedia, which was launched in 2003.

The project has been dubbed Wikiasari — a combination of wiki, the Hawaiian word for quick, and asari, which is Japanese for "rummaging search".

Mr Wales told The Times that he was planning to develop a commercial version of the search engine through Wikia Inc, his for-profit company, with a provisional launch date in the first quarter of next year....

Mr Wales believes that Google's computer-based algorithmic search program is no match for the editorial judgment of humans....Mr Wales aims to exploit the same network of followers and the same type of free software [used for Wikipedia] to create his search engine.

"Essentially, if you consider one of the basic tasks of a search engine, it is to make a decision: 'this page is good, this page sucks'," Mr Wales said. "Computers are notoriously bad at making such judgments, so algorithmic search has to go about it in a roundabout way. But we have a really great method for doing that ourselves," he added. "We just look at the page. It usually only takes a second to figure out if the page is good, so the key here is building a community of trust that can do that."

Mr Wales believes that the reputation already fostered by his Wikipedia community and the transparency of his technology will build sufficient trust in his search engine to bring in advertising revenue and make the Wikiasari venture profitable....

Update (12/29/06). Ben Vershbow corrects some widespread errors about this project. For more corrections and new details, see Danny Sullivan's interview with Jimmy Wales.

Update (1/6/07). To follow this story, subscribe to the mailing list or read the Search Wikia blog set up by Jimmy Wales.