Tech billionaire Elon Musk has launched a new online encyclopedia, Grokipedia, describing it as a “truth-driven alternative” to Wikipedia, which he has repeatedly accused of political and ideological bias.
The platform, developed by Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI, went live on Monday under version 0.1 — featuring over 885,000 articles by evening. Wikipedia, by contrast, currently hosts more than seven million English-language entries.
Musk said a more advanced version 1.0 would arrive soon and be “10 times better,” insisting the current version was already superior to Wikipedia.
“The goal of Grok and Grokipedia.com is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. We will never be perfect, but we shall nonetheless strive towards that goal,” Musk wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
Musk vs Wikipedia: A long-standing feud
The Tesla and SpaceX boss has long criticized Wikipedia, accusing its volunteer editors of promoting what he calls “far-left narratives.” In 2024, he alleged the site was “controlled by activists” and urged users to stop donating to the non-profit platform.
Earlier this year, Musk claimed Wikipedia was too biased to serve as a source for Community Notes — a crowd-sourced fact-checking feature on X — saying its editorial control “is extremely left-leaning.”
Musk said the official launch of Grokipedia, initially scheduled for September, had been delayed to “purge out the propaganda.”
AI-driven encyclopedia
Unlike Wikipedia’s user-edited model, Grokipedia’s content is generated by artificial intelligence, powered by xAI’s chatbot Grok. The site features articles that combine factual summaries with Musk’s stated goal of promoting “transparent truth.”
A Grokipedia entry about Musk himself describes him as an innovator who has “influenced global debates on technological progress, demographic decline, and institutional bias,” while also noting “criticism from legacy media outlets exhibiting systemic left-leaning coverage.”
Wikipedia, founded in 2001, is a free, volunteer-run encyclopedia that describes its mission as providing knowledge from a neutral point of view. It remains largely funded through public donations.
AFP has contacted Wikipedia for comment on Musk’s latest remarks.
