Gawker: valleywag, wikia search

Jimmy Wales Definitely Not Getting His Wikipedia Jet Now

Owen Thomas — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 18:11:36 EDT

Did you know the founder of Wikipedia had a search engine? By the numbers, it's unlikely, since Wikia Search, Jimmy Wales's would-be Google killer, only attracted 10,000 users a month. He's now closing it.

Wales blamed the economy for Wikia Search's failure, which aimed to have volunteer editors revise Web search results rather than relying on an algorithm like Google's. But could his diffident attitude been the real cause? He did find Wikia Search useful — for impressing a girlfriend. Wales mentioned it in sex-laden IM chats with Canadian right-wing pundit Rachel Marsden, with whom he had a brief relationship early in 2008. "Work? Do I have a job or something?" Wales asked Marsden. "Oh right, I am supposed to be designing a Google-killing search engine so I can buy a jet!" (Later, Wales dumped Marsden on Wikipedia.)

Jimmy Wales quotes Ayn Rand at Boston event

Owen Thomas — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 18:20:00 EDT

A recent appearance by Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales was bookended by quotes from Ayn Rand, the founder of Objectivism. And tech glitches: "You'd think that a threat to Google could easily menace a laptop into submission, but apparently Jimmy just doesn't do his own tech work." Much like his latest project, Wikia Search, a for-profit venture which relies on volunteer contributions to its algorithms. [Bostonist]

Jimmy Wales vs. Barney Pell

Owen Thomas — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 18:00:00 EDT

We have a hard time picking a loser in the contest for world's worst search-engine startup: Powerset, where the founders' love triangle proved far more interesting than its technology, or Wikia Search, Jimmy Wales's laughably nonfatal Google killer. What both have in common: Their search results prominently feature links to Wikipedia, also founded by Wales. Wikia Search, like Wikipedia, has volunteers edit its search results; Powerset uses an algorithm to analyze Wikipedia pages, and tries to answer the questions implicit in users' searches accordingly. Wales is unimpressed by Powerset. But we're struck by how much he and Powerset cofounder Barney Pell have in common — a semantic link neither search engine has uncovered.

Jimmy Wales's estranged wife watches over his Wikia failure

Owen Thomas — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 12:40:00 EDT

Believers in the wisdom of crowds will tell you that wikis, those collections of anyone-can-edit Web pages, are resistant to vandalism. Not so Jimmy Wales's Wikia Search, an attempt to build a search engine along wiki lines, which he is once again touting, this time to Forbes. The search results for "Jimmy Wales" currently display a header with a picture of a smiling woman. Who is she, and what does she tell us about Wikia Search?

She is none other than Christine Wales, Jimmy's wife, who is divorcing him. A cruel jibe? Certainly. And predictable. "Obviously lots of people are going to put a link to something horrible into search results just to see what happens," Wales tells Forbes. But it's informative all the same. What the picture's inclusion by some online vandal shows is that Wikia Search, Wales's promised "Google killer," is nothing more than a playground for juvenile twerps. That in turn confirms the maxim that every online community is shaped by the personality of its founder.