The vice president of engineering at Google, Udi Manber, has announced the testing of a new publishing platform called Knol. Compared to Wikipedia and Mahalo, Knol is different, even though there are some similarities. Knol is a wiki-like platform and authors can create topics. There are tools to interlink articles and content, but according to Manber:
“An article or “knoll” is just a web page. Where it differs from wiki is its focus on the author. All knolls will highlight who wrote them.”
Although this may not seem like much of a difference, it is. Wikipedia is a collaborative system and no one author is listed on a wiki page because each page has many authors. Because each knoll page will be authored, users won’t be able to dive in and edit another page, as is the case with Wikipedia. They will, however, be able to submit edits to the author for approval. The Knol system will also permit authors to make some money from their work.
Some argue that Google should not compete with other publishing platforms, but then there’s Blogger, Google’s biggest success in text-publishing platforms. And don’t forget YouTube.
It would seem to all who like banners that this one waves to give authors a platform for their writing and the chance to get paid. With the Knoll system, a user can read more by a particular author or even subscribe to his or her personal feed.
It may be that this new system will become a Google version of About.com and others of its ilk. Only time will tell and as of yet, it’s all hush-hush as to when this new system will become a reality.
Read [Webware]
Seems a lot like Squidoo. Maybe even the MillionDollarWiki, although cheaper and more popular (i.e. much better.)