Google Launches Knol

T he news of the week is that Google has finally launched Knol . Knol is a tool for publishing content on the network that is based on the principle of collaboration and content creation authorized, in the words of its developers:

The network contains massive amounts of information, but not everything that is known is contained in the network. An enormous amount of information is in people's heads: millions of people know useful things and billions could benefit from this knowledge. Knol will encourage these people to put their knowledge online and make it accessible to everyone.
The fundamental principle of Knol is authorship. Each knol is an author, or group of authors, who sign their content. It is their knol, their voice, their opinion. We hope you have several knols on the same subject, and we think it is good that they did.
With Knol, we are introducing one new method for authors to collaborate we call "moderated collaboration." With this feature, any reader may suggest amendments to a knol which the author may decide to accept, reject, or modify before these changes are visible to the public. This allows authors to accept suggestions from around the world while maintaining control over its content. After all, his name is associated with it.
Knol includes powerful networking tools that allow multiple modes of interaction between readers and authors. People can send content, assigning a score or write a review about a particular knol. Is the author's choice to include in a program knol Adsense ads [...]
We are pleased to announce an agreement with New Yorker which allows any author to add a bullet for knol's extensive catalog of the magazine. The cartoons are an effective-and fun-to state your point of view, even about serious topics.

In short, this is more good news within the network, since there will be the appearance of unauthorized content on various topics that, in principle, are not receiving the necessary attention to other areas in the network. However, you can see the negative side of the story, as they have done some of the authors that I link below, and choosing the version that goes directly Knol against Wikipedia and open content, adapting even to the laws of contents network in the European Union to pass.

The latter approach seems excessive to me the news. The principle of authority is as old as the world, and if I can read an article by Anthony Grafton, Stephen Greenblatt, Amedeo quondam, Jill Kray, John Monfasani, Robert Darnton, Fernando Bouza, Víctor Infantes or infinite so on a particular topic, and provide data to supplement my research, I think it's great news in the field of content creation scientific or academic cut. Wikipedia is a useful tool, make no mistake, but it is a giant with feet of clay from the time when a lot of information, especially in the field of history, literature, art, political philosophy and other branches of humanities-which is, being generous, wrong. Add to this that is becoming a comprehensive resource for college students, and above all, that is becoming a resource that is contrasted with other sources, I believe that the emergence of tools such as Knol should be welcomed, but euphoria, at least so hopefully will lead to specific content online.

The move will allow Google is doing, at least in theory, that people still do not participate so extensively in the network and has an enviable training, can create content with the assurances necessary to feel comfortable. Often, news of this type are received with skepticism and reluctance on the part of the communities located on the Internet, but they do not understand these communities, I think, is that there are an infinite number of people who are unwilling to publish in the network without the premises from which part knol. I think that nobody can overlook that there is a very large representation of specialists in various fields that are not published on the network by reticence with regard to the place that their texts can play within an academic framework, and I think Knol offers a plausible answer to encourage them to share their work in a more open.

It is not a perfect tool, obviously. The association with the contents of an ID-style academic eprint or other modes of legitimation of internet content, would encourage many research projects that are doing really interesting things to use knol as a repository of their results, with the advantage to allow the amendment in principle, other experts not involved in the project. This opens novel possibilities for collaboration that can have a positive impact for the field of humanities.

In short, everything I present here belongs to the realm of theory. You will need to see how the project evolves and, above all, what kind of materials are appearing on the platform. From here, at least, will be followed with curiosity.

You can see different approaches to the news ...

TechCrunch: Google Launches Knol, the wikipedia paid . In French, TechCrunch focuses on the fact advertisements related to the Knol content, and reflects on the spur which implies that the most visited content generate money to their authors.
Problogger: Google Knol - the end of the wikipedia or the end of blogs . Darren Rowse, the owner of one of the most popular blogs for bloggers, Google analyzes the passage of the management of external content to create their own content and analyzed with enough common sense that the real difficulty Knol endangering both wikipedia to the blogs.
Journalistopia: The Google Knol directly facing content companies . A very interesting and evaluated information on Knol may pose problems with the main Google service, the form, precisely because it raises is the creation of "authorized content on specific topics," here I think is where the problem Knol and media will have to see what Google has to manage it (maybe add a tab as it did with google groups, scholar, books, images, etc.).
Error 500. Two articles in the Antonio Ortiz Blog: Knol-air , with the wrong approach, I think. I do not think Google Knol is posing direct competition to Wikipedia, nor do I believe that wikipedia is the ideal solution for doctors who speak Ortiz, Wikipedia is collaborative in a way that only enhances the public reception, but not directly power network cooperation, nor verify the information with other specialists, in wikipedia only see the result, but can not see the process by which the outcome was, "I think here is the strong point of knol . The Wikipedia raises a hierarchy of users . Simple mention of Knol as an alternative to the Wiki for the approach of what Ortiz called in the previous article as classical meritocracy, and that many simply see it as the authority granting the work of years on a given subject to the highest academic level and simple.
Loogic.com: Knol, Google's encyclopedia . Again on the prioritization of Knol in Google's own search engine, fair and informative article.
Journalists 21: Knol and the end of the neutrality of Google . Article apocalyptic and totally unfair to Google, wikipedia or Knol will be threatened with, nor do I think, again, that is posing as a direct attack on the platform. Rather: what you can do an interesting tool Knol is its collaborative nature and open countryside to specialists in the field that can compare with other specialists, and we as people throughout the process, can you ask for?