Help Center » Frequently Asked Questions

Frequently Asked Questions

  1. What is Freebase?
  2. What is the relationship between Freebase and Metaweb?
  3. How's Freebase different from Wikipedia? From GoogleBase?
  4. How can I participate?
  5. Why would I want to contribute?
  6. What are the guidelines for contributing?
  7. What are the rules for using the data in Freebase?
  8. How do I know the data's accurate?
  9. Do I have to pay to use Freebase?
  10. How does Metaweb plan to make money?
  11. How can I contact Metaweb?
  12. Are you hiring?

  1. What is Freebase?

    Freebase is an open database of the world’s information. It is built by the community and for the community—free for anyone to query, contribute to, build applications on top of, or integrate into their websites.

    Already, Freebase covers millions of topics in hundreds of categories. Drawing from large open data sets like Wikipedia, MusicBrainz, and the SEC, it contains structured information on many popular topics, like movies, music, people and locations—all reconciled and freely available via an open API. This information is supplemented by the efforts of a passionate global community of users, who are working together to add structured information on everything from philosophy to European railway stations to the chemical properties of common food ingredients.

    In fact, part of what makes Freebase unique is that it spans domains—but requires that a particular topic exist only once in Freebase, even if it might normally be found in multiple databases. For example, Arnold Schwarzenegger would appear in a movie database as an actor, a political database as a governor and a bodybuilder database as a Mr. Universe. In Freebase, there is only one topic for Arnold Schwarzenegger, with all three facets of his public persona brought together. The unified topic acts as an information hub, making it easy to find and contribute information about him.

    In addition to reconciling many facets of one topic, the underlying structure of Freebase lets you run complex queries—that is, ask questions of the data—that are difficult or impossible to run in conventional databases. For example, if you ask Freebase for Jennifer Connelly films with actors who have appeared in a Steven Spielberg movie, you’ll get a tidy list of eight movies. The extra-cool part is that if you’re a developer, or just mildly technical, Freebase offers tools that make it easy to query and integrate the data into web apps, blogs, wikis, user pages or anything else that would benefit from an injection of structured information. 

    Finally, while information in Freebase appears to be structured much like a conventional database, it’s actually built on a system that allows any user to contribute to the schemas—or frameworks—that hold the data. This wiki-like approach to structuring information lets many people organize the database without formal, centralized planning. And it lets subject experts who don’t have database expertise find one another, and then build and maintain the data in their domain of interest.

  2. What is the relationship between Freebase and Metaweb?
    Metaweb is a technology company based in San Francisco. Freebase is the product we have spent the last few years developing.

  3. How's Freebase different from Wikipedia? From GoogleBase?

    Wikipedia and Freebase both appeal to people who love to use and organize information. The difference lies in the way they store information. Wikipedia arranges information in the form of articles. Freebase lists facts and statistics. Freebase’s list form is good not only for people who like to glance at facts, but also for people who want to use the data to build other web sites and software. Information in article form can’t be reused in the same way (though, obviously, articles are awesome for other purposes).

    In addition, the topics covered by Freebase include subjects that are too obscure for Wikipedia, which strives for notability appropriate to an encyclopedia. 

    GoogleBase is a whole ‘nother ball of wax. The data in Freebase is all shared and collectively editable, with a single instance of each topic (as described in Question 1). Google Base, on the other hand, lets you help other people find your data, but it doesn’t provide a community editing tool nor does it attempt to reconcile data sets. It's a different animal.

  4. How can I participate?

    There are five primary things you can do with Freebase:

    1) Browse and read information. If you’re looking for something specific, use the search and filter features. If you’re just exploring, start on the Domains & Types page (clicking the Data link at the top of any page takes you there, too). You can also just navigate around the site.

    2) Edit existing data. Many topics need additional info, and you can add details to your heart’s content. Or, if you see a mistake, you can dive in and correct it. 

    3) Upload new data sets. While we’re endlessly interested in more data, we’re better equipped to handle conceptual rather than statistical information on topics, and we have some guidelines on the kinds of data that best fit the system. If you have a data set you want to share, contact us for help with a bulk upload. 

    4) Build applications that use Freebase data. For ideas, check out these featured apps. When you’re ready to build your own, the developer center gives you all the tools to get started, including an API and mjt, the Metaweb JavaScript Templating language.

    5) Suggest and create schemas for new data. Schemas are the frameworks that hold data and help determine the relationships between separate pieces of information. Schema building is commonly known as data modeling, and we’ve written up some guidelines for tackling it in Freebase. 

  5. Why would I want to contribute?

    Here are three good reasons to contribute to Freebase:

    1) You’ve got a bunch of data that you’d like to share with the world. Freebase gives you a place to do it. A related benefit: once your data is in Freebase, you or anyone else can run MQL (Metaweb Query Language) queries against it.

    2) You’ve got a bunch of data that you’d like to share, and said data would benefit from the knowledge and refinement efforts of other people. Freebase gives you a place to share it and others a place to improve it.

    3) You don’t have data, but you're an authority on something, and you like sharing your expertise. Freebase lets you dive into the details and improve or add to existing data.

  6. What are the guidelines for contributing?
    Check out the Freebase Contribution Guidelines. They're key to your happy participation!

  7. What are the rules for using the data in Freebase?
    Freebase uses a Creative Commons license known as an “attribution” or “by” license. It means that if you're welcome to use the Freebase data on your own site, as long as you credit Freebase as the source. (Creative Commons is a non-profit organization that has developed free, public licenses that let creators make their work available so that other people can legally build on and share it.) Put another way: the data in Freebase is available for commercial or non-commercial purposes—just remember to attribute it to Freebase.com and the community that created it, as described in the licensing policy.

  8. How do I know the data's accurate?

    Actually, you don’t know for sure. Because Freebase lets anyone edit the data, there’s always a chance that somebody has—intentionally or unintentionally—introduced a mistake. By the same token, data in the system can be cleaned up by anyone, and people make incremental improvements all the time. (For more information on our approach to intentional errors, see our Contribution Guidelines and our Vandalism topic.)

    One of the challenges any database faces—whether its job is keeping track of responses to a wedding invitation or holding information collected by the US Census—is ensuring good, clean data. While no database is perfect, the eyes and efforts of a whole community can move a data set in the right direction.

  9. Do I have to pay to use Freebase?
    Nope. It’s free to use—whether you’re browsing, editing, uploading or using the data for your own purposes. Hence the name “Freebase.”

  10. How does Metaweb plan to make money?
    Metaweb provides access to its technology through an API program. Depending on the commercial vs. non-commercial nature of the API use, and the extent of services required by a developer or publisher, varying fees might apply. We also hope to serve relevant ads alongside the content at some point in the future.

  11. How can I contact Metaweb?
    The discussion associated with each topic in Freebase is a great way to get in touch. You can also use the Bug/Feature request page, or the Feedback form, which sends a note directly to Metaweb staffers.

  12. Are you hiring?
    Of course. Check out our jobs page.