Once an icon of the 20th century seen as disused in the 21st , Encyclopaedia Britannica — now be intimate as just Britannica — is all in on artificial intelligence , and may soon go public at a valuation of nearly $ 1 billion , allot to theNew York Times .
Until 2012when printing process ended , the companionship ’s books served as the oldest continuously published , English - language encyclopedias in the world , essentially collect all the world ’s knowledge in one place before Google or Wikipedia were a matter . That has helped Britannica pivot into the AI geezerhood , where models benefit from approach to high - character , vetted entropy . More oecumenical - determination models like ChatGPT have from hallucination because they have hoovered up the intact internet , including all the junk and misinformation .
While it still offers an online edition of its encyclopedia , as well as the Merriam - Webster dictionary , Britannica ’s bountiful business enterprise today is selling on-line education software to schools and libraries , the software it hopes to supercharge with AI . That could mean using AI to tailor-make larn plans for individual scholarly person . The idea is that students will relish learning more when software can help them understand the crack in their understanding of a topic and appease on it longer . Another education tech society , Brainly , late announced that result from its chatbot will link to the exact scholarship material ( i.e. textbooks ) they reference .
Encyclopaedia Britannica could soon go public at a valuation over $1 billion after pivoting into an AI education company.Rod Lawton/PhotoPlus Magazine/Future via Getty
Britannica ’s CEOJorge Cauzalso differentiate theTimesabout the company’sBritannica AI chatbot , which allows users to inquire dubiousness about its huge database of encyclopedic cognition that it compile over two centuries from vetted academics and editors . The ship’s company similarly offers chatbot software for client service use cases .
Britannica told the Times it is require revenue to duplicate from two years ago , to $ 100 million .
Another company in the space of selling education products that has seen its fortunes go the diametric direction is Chegg . The caller has seen itsstock price plummetalmost in lock - gradation with the ascent of OpenAI ’s ChatGPT , as scholar canceled their subscription to its online knowledge platform .
Similar to the rise of Wikipedia before , it seems many people appreciate the access and appliance of ChatGPT , even if they know it can not be trusted entirely . Chegg has long had an online Q&A weapons platform for homework service where users can ante up to submit query and get answers back . But during the pandemic it saw a flood of new users , throw contractor at answer a torrent of novel doubtfulness , and simply could not keep up with ChatGPT . user have complained that solutions on Chegg are too often incorrect , specially when they are submitted by other users rather than pro .
Perhaps the esteemed brand and legacy of Britannica will serve it succeed in this new age where chatbots are still apt to bring back incorrect data . It seems like schools are at least willing to pay for access to something they can be more confident in .
Artificial intelligenceBooksEducationencyclopedias
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