Elon Musk has had a long-standing rift with Wikipedia and how it handles data. Hence, his AI firm, xAI, has come up with an alternative to deliver a better encyclopedia than Wikipedia has ever been (at least that’s what Musk claims). It is called Grokipedia and if the name isn’t suggestive enough, it relies on Grok’s AI to offer an information-heavy encyclopedia without having a political bias.
Grokipedia became accessible to the public in the early hours of Tuesday. However, the website experienced a brief crash before stabilising moments later. Grokipedia represents the first product of its kind in the emerging category of AI encyclopedias, where they leverage large language models for information synthesis.
How Grokipedia differs from Grok, ChatGPT
Unlike conventional AI chatbots such as ChatGPT or Grok, Grokipedia operates with a unique search methodology, which is currently limited by its initial 0.1 model stage. Rather than engaging with full natural language prompts (e.g., “Tell me something about Barcelona”), users must simply enter the name of the subject they wish to research (e.g., “Barcelona”).
According to its homepage, Grokipedia currently features approximately 885,000 articles, which is far from what Wikipedia hosts. The platform utilises a hybrid model to generate information, combining primary sources with information contributed by its community, which is then synthesised and presented by the xAI algorithm.
Elon Musk wants Grokipedia to be neutral
The development of Grokipedia follows Musk’s public allegations that Wikipedia harbours politically motivated information. With Grokipedia, his goal is to provide a more fact-based and unbiased perspective on information.
However, the launch of Grokipedia wasn’t without some public scrutiny. Shortly after launch, users on social media platforms noted quirks in the AI-generated content. For instance, the entry for Elon Musk included specific and non-essential personal details, such as the claim that the tech magnate had lost 20 kilograms in weight — a detail that sparked controversy on Grokipedia’s pursuit of objectivity.
On the other hand, Musk has acknowledged that Grokipedia is in its nascent stage at the moment, with version 0.1. Musk is promising a “10x better result” with the release of version 1.0.
How to access Grokipedia
You can head over to https://grokipedia.com/ and log in with your X account to get started. Note that there are no official apps released by xAI on either Android or iOS, which is why you should be wary of any fake apps posing as the Grokipedia app trying to steal your account details.
