Spock named itself “the first search engine for finding people on the web”. And maybe that’s true, and maybe even a good thing. Spock filters information about people out of web pages and creates profiles around those names. Maybe it’s even the first stalk engine on the web too.

Spock is a beta version of an engine related to the Semantic Web. Spock thinks and understands. Spock knows and seeks. Spock knows everybody. The Web is gonna be more like a living person. Understanding.

But when I tested the Spock engine by searching for Jan Peter, to see how accurate it works, I got the following in return.

Indeed, it is the one and only Jan Peter Balkenende. And indeed, he is a protestant and maybe even 51 years old. But I doubt that he’d uploaded the image himself, or that it’s even a realistic presentation of the person. And does JP wanted to be known like this on the Semantic Web? Does he want to make history like this? Maybe we shouldn’t take Spock to serious.

Question is: where does Spock got it’s information from? If whe look further by clicking on the Legohead we get his Spock profile and ‘hey!’, his description comes form his MySpace. Well, that would be good. Although, if that MySpace profile is a truly profile made by the person himself, with correct information. But according to the photo it isn’t. And according to a visit (see image below) it’s clear that this isn’t a profile page of a priminister who is taking himself serious.

Based on this information you could doubt the reliability of Spock. And maybe even the upcoming Semantic Web. Because, how far can computers and engines go with understanding? How semantic is a thing without a brain? These are just a few questions which came up in me when using this part of the upcoming Web 4.0. It seems to be a great challange to get the Semantic Web where we want it.