[474] in Privacy_Forum
[ PRIVACY Forum ] Wolfram|Alpha, Google, and the Castle Anthrax
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (privacy@vortex.com)
Thu May 7 13:21:57 2009
Date: Thu, 7 May 2009 09:56:52 -0700
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Wolfram|Alpha, Google, and the Castle Anthrax
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000560.html
Greetings. By now, you may (or may not) have heard the buzz
surrounding a new "computational knowledge engine" called
"Wolfram|Alpha" (henceforth, "WA") that is about to launch
( http://www.wolframalpha.com ).
There's been a lot of discussion about this project, including this
interesting analysis of its capabilities, privacy concerns, and other
related discussion by Andy Oram
( http://praxagora.com/andyo/article/saas_wolfram_alpha.html ).
The big question floating around seems to be, is WA a "Google Killer"?
Load scaling issues aside for the moment, the answer for now at least
would appear to be no -- the primary purposes of WA and Google seem to
be very different.
WA is oriented toward trying to provide *the* answer (with
sources noted) to direct questions like "What is the population
density of Paris, France?" -- with the additional capability of
"comparing and contrasting" various data in flexible ways.
In essence, if you asked Google how many angels can dance on the head
of a pin, Google would return an array of references discussing this
critical issue.
WA, on the other hand, if asked the same question, would presumably
try to tell you exactly how many angels could be stuffed onto that
small surface area.
That's a facetious example of course -- while Google could indeed
handle that question, it's not the sort of query you'd reasonably make
of WA.
But this does bring up a key issue -- what are the relative benefits
of being shown a range of query results relating to a question, vs. a
single answer presented as authoritative?
By and large, Google and Wolfram|Alpha are operating with very
different information space points of view.
I'd be remiss if didn't note some concerns about Wolfram|Alpha's name.
Branding these days is very important, and Wolfram|Alpha sounds more
like a fictional planet from the "Aliens" movie franchise than an
Internet service. Worse still, there's even confusion about that "|"
in the name. Officially it apparently is supposed to be in there, but
many articles are leaving it out -- in fact it's left out in key
places on their own site as well!
Let's face it, Wolfram|Alpha just doesn't roll off the tongue in a
Googley way, and as we know from the Castle Anthrax
in "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" -- names do matter!
( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjio-F47IfM )
It will be interesting to see how Wolfram|Alpha develops, along with
similar technologies that we can expect to see deployed elsewhere.
But it appears that the secret demographics of pinhead-dwelling angels
remain secure for the time being.
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren@vortex.com
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
http://www.pfir.org/lauren
Co-Founder, PFIR
- People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
Co-Founder, NNSquad
- Network Neutrality Squad - http://www.nnsquad.org
Founder, GCTIP - Global Coalition
for Transparent Internet Performance - http://www.gctip.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/laurenweinstein
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