Grokipedia v0.1: Ilon Muskaa’s new encyclopedia copies Wikipedia
By ForGeeks
After the launch of Grokipedia, users found that many of the articles were almost verbatim to Wikipedia material.
The xAI company has brought Grokipedia — its own AI-driven encyclopedia online. The service launched in v0.1 and initially looked like a simplified copy of Wikipedia: a home page with a large search bar and standard headings, subheadings and links to sources. For a look at Grokipedia, see here.
Design and functionality
The Grokipedia interface is still extremely minimalistic. There are no illustrations on the pages. Users noted that the «Edit» button doesn’t appear everywhere and doesn’t allow you to make your own changes — only to view edits already made by someone else without specifying the authors.
Each article is captioned «checked by Grok» with the date «fact-checked». This feature is controversial: large language models often create unreliable information, and the promised «verification» does not guarantee accuracy.
Copies of Wikipedia pages
Despite Ilon Musk’s claims that Grokipedia will be «a significant improvement» to Wikipedia, some of the articles literally reproduce the original texts. A notice at the bottom of the page about the MacBook Air reads «Content adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0». The same captions were found in the materials about PlayStation 5 and Lincoln Mark VIII — the texts match the wiki originals almost word for word.
A similar caption was found in the materials about PlayStation 5 and Lincoln Mark VIII — the texts match the wiki originals almost word for word.
Wikimedia Foundation spokesperson Lauren Dickinson noted that «even Grokipedia needs Wikipedia to exist». The organization reminded us that Wikipedia’s strength —lies in its transparent moderation and volunteer teamwork, and its content remains free precisely because of its nonprofit status.
Wikimedia Foundation spokeswoman Lauren Dickinson said that Wikipedia’s strength lies in its nonprofit status.
Differences in interpretations
Not all Grokipedia articles copy Wikipedia verbatim. On some topics, like climate change, the differences are fundamental. While Wikipedia emphasizes the near-unanimous scientific consensus on the human role in warming, Grokipedia says that «claims of unanimity exaggerate the consensus of scientists» and that media and environmental organizations «increase anxiety and shape the debate without sufficient reliance on data».”
Scale and version
According to the counter on the home page, Grokipedia has over 885,000 articles — compared to seven million on the English Wikipedia. The site lists version v0.1, emphasizing the early stage of development. Musk has promised to «fix» the borrowings by the end of the year.
