Comments on: Google Knol Launches

By: Monica - current accounts

Monica - current accounts — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 10:50:59 +0000

The URLs make me shudder – they definitely look author centric to me rather than taking the subject as the first part of the URL. As a browser I don’t really care who wrote the article, unless I’m trying to check the authenticity.

By: Chris Desouza

Chris Desouza — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 23:57:45 +0000

Google knol is the “Do no evil” slap on the face and then apologize mantra being used by Google all the time.

As if Google search does not do a good enough job searching for keyword information that it had to launch the Knol.

It is all good. But, is it necessary?

By: Utah SEO Pro

Utah SEO Pro — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 23:58:45 +0000

Time for spammers to get their spam on. Utah SEO Pro's last blog post..Advanced Keyword Research for SEO

By: David Petherick

David Petherick — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:25:35 +0000

I think it’s too early to say what Knol’s effect will be, but Knol might create communities of accredited / affiliated experts, which will also have the ability to include the ad-hoc expertise (or refreshing common sense) of anyone who wishes to comment on or add to an article.

The content with the best headline or keenest, most relevant keywords may also rise above more authoritative content.

I commented on the fact that only authors in the USA can currently verify their identity in Knol in my Blog at The Next Web today – http://thenextweb.org/2008/07/24/for-whom-the-google-knols/ and made the point that there could be a danger of spam / gaming if Google does not integrate authorship in Knol with OpenID or even Google’s offeringss like Adsense, Orkut or Google Checkout.

I do think this is a disruptive, game-changing development, but I can see a lot of opportunities and threats for it.

David Petherick’s last blog post..Nokia loses top executive too, Mike Baker wants to seed startups instead

By: Top Rated Digital

Top Rated Digital — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:12:34 +0000

Does this really give us something different, that isn't out there with the likes of WordPress, Squidoo, and Wikipedia? Sounds like some engineer at Google couldn't find enough to keep them busy, and were really good at promoting their own pet project. Top Rated Digital's last blog post..What's The Top Rated Canon Digital Camera?

By: Warenwirtschaft

Warenwirtschaft — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:21:36 +0000

I think this will become a great tool for spammers. There is no authority that defines who is an authority. Articles cannot be deleted by the community like it is possible at wikipedia. So poor content stays active.
I see no future for this service.

By: SEO I-COM

SEO I-COM — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 09:48:25 +0000

This raises so many questions and doubts.

If Google considered Squidoo lenses not worthy enough to be in their search results why are they setting up their own Squidoo?

How is the content be controlled? This can quite easily become another spam haven in a similar fashion to many article direstories.

If this happens Knols will be a backpain for both users and webmasters alike. For webmasters because it could be another Wikipedia with undisputed reserved places in the search results for most good keywords. For users because search results would have more garbage.

Keeping a close eye!

Tino

By: a

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 06:22:46 +0000

there is so much happening at google knol’s orkut community
http://www.orkut.co.in/Community.aspx?cmm=16576078

By: Reactions to Knol Launch From Around the Web

Reactions to Knol Launch From Around the Web — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 05:02:23 +0000

[...] McCollum is concerned about the many-knols-on-one-topic quandary: “But, to ask search engines’ perennial spam-defining question, is it good for users? You [...]

By: Joe Hall

Joe Hall — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 23:15:21 +0000

@Aaron you can bypass the nofollow tags by writing your own HTML and pasting it in the HTML section. At least that's what I did, and it worked for me. Joe Hall's last blog post..Top 5 National Real Estate Franchise Web Sites

By: Aaron

Aaron — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 23:03:08 +0000

It’s interesting that pretty much every link on a knol, and every link added by an author, is “nofollowed”. They trust the authority of their authors, but not the authority of their authors’ links?

It’s hard to tell what, if any, organization the knol site will have, other than a bunch of featured knols on the main page along with a search box.

When I signed up, the AdSense confirmation page indicates that the knol site takes 0% of the AdSense revenue earned by knol pages, so it appears that the revenue share will be roughly the same as a publisher would earn on his or her own site.

By: Eduardo

Eduardo — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 22:12:14 +0000

I wonder if their acquisition of Digg will add something to this as well. Seeing as Wiki is such a well rated resource it is often in the top 10 for almost any search on Google right now…Wonder how Google plans to tackle that.

By: Paul Deeds

Paul Deeds — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 21:38:41 +0000

At HubPages we’ve been offering a very similar open publishing platform for almost two years. In that time 30,000 different authors have produced over 150,000 articles (what we call hubs). Given our success and the success of Squidoo and others, it’s no surprise that Google wants to jump into the game.

However, we think that we are ahead of the Knol in several ways –

1. Design & Discovery – we organize hubs around tags and topics, and have a time tested rating system called HubScore that brings the best authors and content to the top.

2. Authoring Tools – for users that don’t know HTML we make it really easy for them to add and position videos, photos, news feeds, and products from amazon or eBay.

3. Community – we have a large and established base of authors along with seamlessly integrated community features like forums, fan activity feeds (we call hubtivity), and requests (question and answer).

4. Money — We give our authors a larger variety of ways to make money from their work. They can choose to run from 0 to 3 AdSense spots (automatically optimized using our YieldBuild technology). They can also augment their AdSense income with Amazon or eBay affiliate links or Kontera contextual advertising.

I’m sure the Knol team will be working hard to add some of these things, so we’re going to have to work even harder to stay ahead of them. We welcome the competition!

By: Nick Stamoulis

Nick Stamoulis — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 21:29:48 +0000

Well it does seem to have a different approach than Wikipedia (ie – not having a nazi-like strictness to article publishing) but you’re right – it does not mean that any of these pieces will be closer to the truth – we suppose it’s simply another social community in the works?

Nick Stamoulis’s last blog post..You Are Now Linkedin To The New York Times