This New York Times piece puts Wolfram Alpha into perspective. In short, it will exist alongside Google and not supplant it. Interestingly, creator Stephen Wolfram dislikes the hype and comparisons of his tool to Google. How come? Wolfram Alpha is simply an animal unto its own:
“WolframAlpha is different. For starters, it does not gather data from the Web. Instead, its “knowledge base” is made up of reams and reams of data — ranging from the kinds of facts you would find in a World Almanac, to highly specialized data from physics and other sciences — that some 100 employees at Wolfram Research have gathered, verified and organized over several years.”
Special thanks to Jeremy Andrykowski for sending me the link to the NYT article!
Perennial Searcher 