Wolfram Alpha search engine review: politics equals fail
"Wolfram Alpha" (wolframalpha.com) is a new search engine from the creator of Mathematica software. Unlike other search engines it doesn't give a list of links to other sites, trying instead to answer the question.
If you ask it "what is the value of pi ^ 100000?" it quickly comes back with "Decimal approximation: 9.7111220720970479180788524703324638313120691510... x 10^49714".
However, several searches about political and non-scientific matters show that it'll be a while before we've reached the Star Trek computer stage of technology. It appears to have been seeded with very limited biographical information on various persons of interest, limited to their name and date/place of birth. It also lists Wikipedia as one of their generic sources; using that very questionable source is not a good sign. They also link to that disinfo source for more information on the searched topic. They also have a "search the web" selection that leads to Google.
Here are some search results, followed by the question(s) that generated it:
Baltimore:
where was nancy pelosi born
Hope:
where was bill clinton born
Honolulu:
where was obama born (Note: we don't know that for certain)
Chicago:
where was michelle obama born
I am a computational knowledge engine.
who are you? (Note: obviously this was a seeded answer)
No result:
where was john mccain born
where was sarah palin born
what is comprehensive immigration reform
what are barack obama's policies
who was the best president?
how much wood can woodchucks chuck?
what is health reform?
is sarah palin from alaska?
does nancy pelosi tell the truth?
nancy pelosi and the cia?
airline food, what's up with that?
I just flew in from pittsburgh and boy are my arms tired. How tired are they?
britney or christina?
42
what is the meaning of life?
[Information about Albania's currency, the Lek]
what is the meaning of it all?
word map:
what is amnesty
definition:
immigration
map showing distance from Alaska to Palin, Guatemala:
palin from alaska
Comments
Nate (not verified)
Sat, 05/16/2009 - 18:46
Permalink
HS 18179 info@barackobamaknows.com 2009-05-16T20:46:28-05:00
We don't need search engines anymore, we can just ask Obama at http://barackobamaknows.com
Anonymous (not verified)
Thu, 05/28/2009 - 17:32
Permalink
HS 18180 angelaysabelle@gmail.com 2009-05-28T19:32:16-05:00
Most average searchers don't need Wolfram Alpha. All they need are search engines like http://find.com, google.com, etc.