Wikipedia Conquering Google First, World Next? - Implications for Search (Page 3 of 4 )
One observer commented about these projects that "as more people rally around them they'll undoubtedly become highly valuable resources, just like the Wikipedia itself." That's certainly possible, at least for those looking for something new or a starting point for information.
Danny Sullivan takes it further; he seems to think that the search engines should emulate Wikipedia. "With search engines sending Wikipedia so much traffic, you'd think they'd consider doing even more to add direct answers or encyclopedia entries right in their results. They've done much more of this over the years. But clearly people want even more reference material, and Wikipedia seems to be getting the bulk of that traffic. That's not so bad - Wikipedia has plenty of great resources. But as many feel Wikipedia turns up in practically every search result on Google, it suggests that perhaps tighter and more official integration into results might be helpful to searchers."
In fact, Wikipedia has been at the center of some search engine ideas itself. With permission from the Wikimedia Foundation, start up company SearchMe created WikiSeek, a search engine that indexes only Wikipedia sites, plus sites that are linked to from Wikipedia. Ideally, this should reduce the amount of spam that shows up in search results.
There's also Wikia Search, formerly Wikisauri. This is a project sponsored by Wikia, a for-profit business corporation founded by Jimmy Wales, the same person who founded Wikipedia and the Wikimedia Foundation. It is said to rely on people to deliver reliable search results instead of spam. It will use freely editable open source software to make it work.
These two search engines are trying to compete with Google. Looking at both of them in the early stages, it seems unlikely that either of them will succeed. Nevertheless, there are certain implications that anyone who has a product or service online should take from Wikipedia entries ranking highly in Google. You should be aware of what, if anything, the user-edited online encyclopedia is saying about your company.
This point was driven home recently by David Wilson in his Social Media Optimization blog. "If your brand is on Wikipedia, then you should be checking it on a regular basis to see whether the information presented there is correct. Checking your Wikipedia entry once is not enough as the site is constantly being updated...Wikipedia doesn't impact just brands. It impacts market segments. Just as Internet users perceive that the top listings on Google are the top brands, users also perceive that the sites listed in Wikipedia for a search are the best and most relevant companies."
Next: The Down Sides of Wikipedia >>
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