Knol: Google’s Twitterpedia, and a medium for debate

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Behold: Knol

Google has unleashed Knol upon the world. Google describes a knol as a “unit of knowledge” and, simultaneously I guess, “an authoritative article about a specific topic”. (As such, I assume it’s pronounced “nawl” and not “nohl”.)

The Twitterpedia

Some of the immediate reaction to this new service seems to center on what Knol’s impact will be on the Wikipedia and on media sites. And Knol does represent a shift for Google from being a conduit to content on the Internet to an actual content provider themselves. Some folks won’t be happy about that.

I don’t see Knol as being a Wikipedia killer. For starters, when they say “an authoritative article about a specific topic,” they mean it. When I put up a knol on how to boost professional credibilty by changing your email address, I discovered that there’s a cap on article length at about 1000 characters. This avoids a situation where every last unimportant detail of something is documented, giving us articles about Batman that are longer than those about War and Peace.

This length cap makes Knol a sort of fusion between Twitter and Wikipedia–a “Twitterpedia,” if you will–providing information in small chunks by design.

Knol should encourage healthy debate and critical thinking

Knol also puts the freedom of editing an article under the control of the original author. The author can open it up to everyone, a la Wikipedia, keep it strictly under their own control, or invite others to be co-authors on the article and subsequently edit.

This could be a great development. Unlike the Wikipedia, where any article represents the truth of something as seen by the last person to make an edit, if someone disagrees with what they read in a knol, they’ll have to write their own knol. A search result will deliver a collection articles that contain contradictory views that should force users to think more critically about they find.

Hm. Maybe it will be a Wikipedia killer.

What do you think about Google’s new Knol service? Leave a comment!