The open-source search engine backed by Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales could go live as an early test version as soon as next week. Unlike Google, Search Wikia will not share search data with advertisers, nor invade privacy by storing users鈥� search terms.
In a SETI@home-style project, 500 volunteers are running web-crawlers to compile Search Wikia鈥檚 web index, which so far totals 100 million pages. Jeremie Miller, the project鈥檚 technology chief, hopes an 鈥渁lpha鈥� version of the engine will be running by Christmas. As well as search, it will offer 鈥渨iki-style tools to improve search and basic social networking鈥�, he says. Users will also be able to vote on the effectiveness of search hits.
But don鈥檛 expect too much, too soon. 鈥淭he alpha version will probably break in numerous ways we can鈥檛 predict, but that鈥檒l help us improve it,鈥� Miller says.
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