Wikipedia founder plans search engine to rival Google

By Adam Turner
Saturday, 23 December 2006 20:13

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Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales is working with Amazon to launch a search engine to rival Google, relying on human judgement rather than algorithms.

Wikiasari is scheduled to launch first quarter of 2007, backed by multimillion-dollar funding from Amazon.com and Silicon Valley financiers, reports the The Times of London. The name is taken from name from wiki, Hawaiian for "quick," and asari, Japanese for "rummaging search".

Wikiasari will use the same user-based technology as Wikipedia, an online encyclopaedia which allows readers to edit entries. The new search engine will work on a similar premise, with Wales claiming Google’s computer-based algorithmic searches are open to manipulation and are no match for human judgement.

Wales' comments come less than two week after Wikipedia unveiled free web hosting for community groups, on the condition they don't charge for their services. Deals of the plan came days after the announcement that Amazon.com was to be the first corporate investor in Wikipedia's commercial arm, Wikia.

Launched in 2001, Wikipedia has more than six million articles and is one of the world's most visited websites. The site has been dogged by controversy over its reliability and accuracy due to the fact readers can edit entries. High profile examples include the re-writing of journalist John Seigenthaler's biography in 2005 to claim he was linked to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy. The incident forced Wikipedia to introduce safe guards into its entry creation and editing process.