Stketcher, yes, in part.

No, you're not missing anything. Mahalo is basically just "search" results showing up within the Google results. To hear Jason tell it you'd think Mahalo is somehow adding their own value or unique content, but look at the average page at Mahalo and you'll clearly see that's not the case. It's mostly just a link farm and blatant SEO ploy. He looks at Digg and Wikipedia constantly popping up in the Google results and wants to somehow replicate that and make money off it.

One of the main reasons social/web2.0 sites have been thriving over the last several years has as much to do with Google as anything. The Internet has always had 'social' sites in some form or another. But it wasn't until Google (and its link-heavy nature) became the dominant force that these sites suddenly found a wider audience. Their very nature meant they were already custom made (and have become even moreso since then) to rank well in Google.

WTF. Why hasn't Google, Jimbo, or Jarvis call Jason out? He hires 60 fulltime people and 400 freelancers making slave wages to spam and pump all the social networks and pollute Google with Mahalo links! Jason requires all the guides to spam to inflate numbers. 400 people are doing damage! Jason did this with WeBlogsInc same story! Netscape failed and all those AOL blogs are dead. Pump and dump GOogle will take anyones money why doesn't anyone call Jason out?? Some journalism please!

Now that is some flawed logic - people upload videos to YouTube for their OWN benefit. YouTube gave folks a place to upload whatever video content they wanted - as opposed to uploading HUGE files and praying their friends have a compatible video player - there's real benefit to the end user here.

If Wikia can show that the users directly benefit each time they help index a result, I think I'll be a believer, but until then I'm a bit skeptical.

-W

The first Google Link on apple pies took me to a page about recipes for Apple pies, but Google further down the page - mentioned Apple computers and Pie charts, which may have been what i wanted, where as Mahalo was just about the fruit.

I think that the Google / Yahoo style of results is better as I prefer the be the human doing the final few yards of searching, get a pile (100) of algorithmic results from the search engine, then I (human) can quickly scan through them and see what I exactly want.

Steve

The most blatant violations of Google's "commitment" to be free of a bias can be seen by Googling the word "jew":

Offensive Search Results
www.google.com/explanation We're disturbed about these results as well. Please read our note here.

Oh wait, maybe that's a form of bias that their users believe to be popular? Does that mean it isn't bias?

And, Doesn't Google test its results quality using humans?

So much for no bias.

But not everything works so smoothly at Mahalo. And I think a big part of it is related to the work for money/work because it is rewarding issue and how the structure of work must be fundamentally different in each case. In Mahalo there is a very rigid hierarchy that must be followed to get a search result approved (and thus the guide getting paid). The problem is Mahalo Mentors or Full Time Guides don't exactly go through a selection process like Google's. I'm not saying that they aren't good at what they do in genereal. Most are. But there are a few who seem to make more mistakes and be more clueless than I'd expect. It is frustrating when your submission gets declined several times with new reasons that the reviewer just didn't mention before, although they were already there. Or when a subject doesn't really fit a category but they want to fit the round peg in the square hole. Or even worse, when you do a result that fits a category, as you've done a similar one before, but the new guide wants you to rewrite everything because on their view another category would be better (even though the term was picked at the original category in the most wanted list the first place). But above all, a part time guide usually picks a subject they know something about and they are comfortable with. And the person who reviews it usally knows less about the subject than the person who created the search result. This shouldn't be a problem since they put themselves in the place of the person searching, who most likely is searching it because they too are clueless about the subject, but sometimes they start asking all sorts of silly questions for no reason! This is very different from a no hierarchy production style in which you expect people who know less than you on that subject to not get on your way, and people who know more to be available to go there and make it better. Point to Wikia Search.

Score so far: Mahalo 1 x 1 Wikia Search.

As a person who has studied the book The Wealth of Networks I believe on Wikia's Search model more than Mahalo's and I see more potential for it in the future. On the other hand, Wikia Search is just a blank canvas at the moment while Mahalo already works. So let's just wait and see who will provide a better service for the users a few years from now.