KGMID SEO
Get the book

KGMID and Knowledge Graph: a glossary

Freebase

What is Freebase?

Freebase was the collaboratively edited knowledge base Google acquired in 2010 and used as a foundation for the Knowledge Graph, and it is the origin of every KGMID beginning /m/.

Who uses the term Freebase?

Freebase is a historical term now, the database having been closed to edits in 2015 and its data partly migrated to Wikidata.

It survives in practice through the /m/ prefix, which practitioners still encounter daily.

How does Freebase differ from related terms?

Freebase was openly editable. The Knowledge Graph is not: you influence it with evidence rather than edits.

Wikidata is the closest live equivalent and is one of the structured sources the graph reads, which is why it appears on entity checklists.

What does KGMID SEO: Claim Your Entity Before Google Defines It for You say about Freebase?

The book uses Freebase only to explain the prefix: IDs beginning /m/ are older entities inherited from Freebase, and /g/ marks entities Google has created since. It treats the distinction as a matter of origin rather than of quality or strength.

Read about the book's argument.

Related terms

  • KGMID

    A KGMID is the unique identifier Google assigns to an entity in its Knowledge Graph, and it is the key every fact, attribute and knowledge panel about that entity connects back to.

  • Knowledge Graph

    The Knowledge Graph is Google's database of things rather than pages: entities, their attributes, and the relationships between them, each stored against a machine ID.

  • Entity resolution

    Entity resolution is the process by which a system decides which known entity a given mention refers to, rather than treating the name as just a string of text.

All 14 terms KGMID SEO: Claim Your Entity Before Google Defines It for You