Google Knol lags far behind Wikipedia

After 6 months of looking back, what honors Knol cannot cause the worry of Wikipedia's online encyclopedia.

Is the development speed not all?

First, we must mention the impressive statistical information of this new generation encyclopedia. Currently, Knol users have published more than 100 thousand knowledge units (knol units) and the project has made an impressive breakthrough in development speed. According to Google's statistics Knolologist, there are 197 different countries and lands that netizens visit Knol every day, from Aland and Antarctica islands to Zambia or Zimbabwe.

However, a very sad news for Knol when very few people appreciate the content on the page, because it is too poor.

As many people are worried that Knol is still in the 'eggs', Knol's current traffic may not be 'difficult' for Wikipedia. This open, 'age-old' encyclopedia of Google is still at the top of the list of search results for its "father" Knol. Even with a detailed article about IPv6 - the kind of information that seems to fit naturally with Knol, the amount of pageview that week is very modest - only about 300 times.

Quality article of Knol, something worth discussing

In order to enhance the quality of the encyclopedia content, Google has put efforts into financial 'shoulders' (for Knol and the authors). However, efficiency is not always the same. Knol attracted more comments from scholars and scientists, but on the contrary, hundreds of other 'scientists' only focused on 'digging gold' with articles that did not come to the end, even is garbage or stolen food!

Finally, Google recognizes the problem. But even with the addition of a valuable tool and reviewing the article to find bad, illegal, or suspicious content, the old problem cannot be resolved overnight.

For example, the keyword ' Barack Obama '. The results of this new president's name list 809 indexes, since it seems that most Knol users are trying to write their own articles rather than adding them to the existing article, the number increases but not synonymous with quality, unfortunately, is inevitable. The arrangement of article quality has not been focused in search results.

Some other articles, while attracting users, seem to be the result of collage work from flyers or digitized versions of published works, for example as an item about the US military. (US Army Survival Manual).

Knol is off the trajectory?

Meanwhile, it seems that Knol's development path is deviating from the trajectory of its own giant encyclopedia "Google Wikipedia" site. Many articles, events, characters are not written in the proper style of the encyclopedia. In contrast, there is a series of 'how-to' tutorials that appear on many topics. Still many people are focusing on developing projects in the direction of Wikipedia and Citizendium, this Knol 'how-to' field is turning Google's service into an eHow.com rival!

With a mix of Wikipedia style and how-to style, users have the feeling that Knol lacks concentration.

It is too early in the development process of Knol to evaluate and especially with potential resources from Google, this project still promises a lot. However, it is a matter of tomorrow and at the present time, Knol still has to change and invest in order to reach the level of Wikipedia.