Google Launches Knol, a Wikipedia Competitor

GeekSugar — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 06:00:54 PDT

Google has just launched a new product called Knol, a website which contains a few hundred articles actually called "Knols." It's similar to Wikipedia in that it's open to the public and encourages "experts" on various topics to contribute their knowledge online, although it differs by making the author of the Knols sign their real names - unlike the anonymity of Wikipedia.

Google will actually go to the trouble of verifying a writer's identity, either by credit card or phone, which is said to only take 20 seconds. I guess once you can see the name behind the content, it definitely adds some reputability to the information being presented.

So far, I'm seeing quite the abundance of health topic entries, but hopefully in due time the subject matter will expand.