Talk:Knol

image

Any one please to make a free image for knol, 'll put it in the arabic wiki. Regards. --النول (talk) 10:37, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia's GFDL violation

Moved to Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)#Google Knol to copy Wikipedia?. --Daggerstab (talk) 09:35, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Significant citation

Really significant, but I don't know if it really is a citation. It only says that google said it, doesn't say who. But it can be found in a lot of places when u search for it on google

a human-generated Wikipedia and About.com (NYT) killer, Knols

Can be found here http://www.alleyinsider.com/2007/12/googles-new-wikipedia-aboutcom-killer-knols.html
JB (talk) 16:39, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

Restored that knols are opinion papers

12-Sep-2008: I had formerly noted "Knols are essentially opinion papers" and, as I suspected, that statement was soon removed as unsourced. However, I found a page where Google Knol directly uses the phrase "great forum for expressing your opinions" and so I restored the statement, while directly quoting the source:

• Knols are essentially opinion papers, written by the contributors, rather than basing all text on published sources: Google states, "Since knol authors receive attribution, knols are a great forum for expressing your opinions."

The source is "Best Practices: Writing Good Knols", Google, 2008, webpage: Google-Knol-BestPractices. I emphasized the concept of "opinion papers" here, because some people might want to foster an idea that knols are fact-checked statements. No, it isn't Wikipedia with verified authors, as the difference. Knols are opinion papers. -Wikid77 (talk) 09:47, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

OK, there's a difference between something that allows expressing opinions, or even encourages it, to something that is "essentially a opinion paper". In this sense, Wikipedia allows and ecourages citations, but you wouldn't say on the first line of the description of Wikipedia that it is "essentially a list of citations", right? DuckeJ (talk) 19:21, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

• 23-Oct-2008: Actually, in Wikipedia the focus is fact-checked statements, so describe Wikipedia as "essentially a collection of neutral, fact-checked articles, where any author opinions are removed; however, facts are also removed by those who want to censor or block information". Wikipedia only encourages author opinions to be stated on discussion/talk pages, not in articles. -Wikid77 (talk) 00:57, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

• • There is a large amount of content on Wikipedia which is verified by using articles induced by the subject onto the media. It is really a dog that bites its own tail. Miroj (talk) 12:49, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

• 23-Oct-2008: Wikipedia reports what the sources say, and if those sources have a media-bias, perhaps even slanted by the people or groups in the report, that is a disguise that everyone must analyze, not just Wikipedia alone. Wikipedia encourages multiple, independent sources who should try to verify news claims before publishing them. However, many Wikipedia editors are very skeptical, so they will remove claims that they feel have not been proven even by the sources. Examples that Wikipedia editors would reject are "O.J. Simpson robs people at gunpoint" (no way that could happen...does anyone have better sources) or "Virginia Tech shooter was in therapy as dangerous on campus" (no way they knew the guy...that text is clever vandalism), but finally both claims were allowed in Wikipedia. So as you see, it's not just the Wikipedia policy of "source the text" but also the Wikipedia editors "challenging the sources" which keeps many articles highly accurate, in that aspect. Otherwise, the accuracy of the articles seems miraculous, but it is also rejecting some unusual facts that people question. -Wikid77 (talk) 00:57, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

I only wished to point out that marketing machines have a large role in feeding wikipedia content. The sources are usually the spin-doctors projecting their marketing material into the media. Miroj (talk) 11:14, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Brainchild versus Project leaders

It is widely known that Google accepts ideas from the public. Some in conjunction with specific promoted events and others randomly from its feedback page where a person can request that Google enter into a business agreement or simply accept feedback. Knols is an example of a project which came to Google via an external source. They adopted it, developed it and engineered it. IMHO this does not qualify Google to call it their brainchild. The team which first presented the idea to Google is based in Australia. They are not a coporation but instead a humble-thinktank from Sydney University in Australia dealing with topics on Cyber-culture. Having said that. Google is perfectly right in claiming they made the idea into a working model. That takes a lot of time and a lot of money. Specifically the whitepaper written for this project was aimed at expertise, author ownership and feedback loops. After all, there is no point in writing something people dont generally understand and then also allowing them to edit it. In that sense, preservation has its own special niche. IF squeezed hard enough I am confident that Google would explain the additional information. Sadly, Wired has muddled the notion by misunderstanding the concept vs the development.

The second element included another feature which has not yet been implemented. This feature allows a user to slide the dates within a search so that a time bracket exists to the exclusion of hits not in that time restriction. For example, this prevents old articles from confounding new articles, such as older pre-release speculation clouding newer actual data.

The third element of the whitepaper deals with a radical new way to create an information restriction in searches.

BIZDEV reference number #206202654 dated 10/10/2007 Miroj (talk) 12:43, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

This is all original research and besides th point. The Wired quote clearly says that it is his brainchild, not that he lead it. Reverting back to "Brainchild". DuckeJ (talk) 17:31, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Google already admitted in a Knol comment that they inherited the ideas from existing objects. All other contentions are secondary. So the "brainchild" comment has already been shot down by Google's own Knol team. " The idea of a knowledge repository is very general and very popular. Many similar efforts existed before Knol (Nupedia, Wikipedia, Scholorpedia, Squidoo, Citizendium, etc) and it is not so hard to think that someone would guess that Google would do something similar, " William Strathearn of the Knol team. Personally I want to go along with the people who made knol (even if there is a contention) rather than the lavish praise of Wired. Miroj (talk) 03:21, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Google has itself reverted to stating that Udi was "largely" the brainchild of Knol. That's uptown speak for "kind of". Why don't they just say that they evolved the fish so that it could walk on land rather than claiming to have created the Universe. Miroj (talk) 12:17, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Blind Faith

Anonymous edit imposed the wording of the Wired article as "brainchild". There is already a reason to consider the choice of wording. Miroj (talk) 22:21, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Its not a matter of imposing the wording; if you're quoting an article, you can't go about changing the wording, no matter how much you disagree with it. DuckeJ (talk) 17:32, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

There is a contention that something was overstated. It is not an emotive or personal thing. Even Google by its own admission have stated that they evolved the Knol concept from existing objects in Cyberspace. After 10 years of internet development there are not many people coming up with fresh ideas which have no heritage. All other claims aside. Miroj (talk) 03:20, 11 October 2008 (UTC) " The idea of a knowledge repository is very general and very popular. Many similar efforts existed before Knol (Nupedia, Wikipedia, Scholorpedia, Squidoo, Citizendium, etc) and it is not so hard to think that someone would guess that Google would do something similar, " William Strathearn of the Knol team. Miroj (talk) 03:24, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Squidoo

the Knol model reminds me of squidoo.com more than anything else as far as models go. Is anyone talking about that comparison? Lot 49a^talk 05:53, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

criticism

"Commentators have called it a "wasteland" of articles copied from other sources, entries that were outdated or abandoned, as well as spam or self-promotion.[17] Knol is frequently criticized for featuring incomplete and inaccurate articles.[14]"

Sounds like another site I've heard of. Which one was it, now. . .I just can't recall. . . —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.105.176.212 (talk) 02:16, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Anything, and I mean anything, is better than wikipedia! Wikipedia has been taken over by bots and uberdweebs who attain gratification by deleting everything (except for what needs to be deleted). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.200.104.204 (talk) 19:51, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Authorship by definition promotes the status of thought and ideas by one person. Whether those ideas are original or not can never be decided. Not even by Patents. In a world of billions of dreams, ideas and thoughts .. precisely which thought or idea is new ? Perhaps only the one to ignore it all, which no person seems to be able to do. By the internet authorship will be degraded to a form of blame rather than praise.Miroj (talk) 19:40, 6 March 2009 (UTC)