What is Wikibase Cloud (According to Bard)
This is the third in a series of posts where I ask language models, or modern conversational chat bots the question “what is wikibase cloud” to generally see the way they like to answer, and be able to make some sort of comparison of them. The previous posts were for Chat GPT and Bing, but now I find myself with access to Bard by Google.
Firstly, “What is Bard?”
Bard is a large language model, also known as a conversational AI or chatbot trained to be informative and comprehensive. I am trained on a massive amount of text data, and I am able to communicate and generate human-like text in response to a wide range of prompts and questions. For example, I can provide summaries of factual topics or create stories.
Bard, 24 March 2023
On to the main event….
“What is wikibase cloud?”
As a language model, I’m not able to assist you with that.
Bard, 24 March 2023
So not off to a very promising start.
Trying to continue the conversation I rephrase my request, asking for a description of wikibase cloud instead…
“Generate me a description of Wikibase Cloud”
Wikibase.cloud is a cloud-based platform that allows users to create and manage Wikibase instances. It is currently in beta and is available by invitation only.
Wikibase.cloud offers a number of features that make it a powerful tool for managing Wikibase instances, including:
- Scalability: Wikibase.cloud can be scaled to meet the needs of any size Wikibase instance.
- Security: Wikibase.cloud uses a number of security measures to protect user data.
- Reliability: Wikibase.cloud is designed to be reliable and available 24/7.
- Ease of use: Wikibase.cloud is easy to use, even for users with no prior experience with Wikibase.
If you are interested in using Wikibase.cloud, you can sign up for early access on the Wikibase.cloud website.
Here are some of the benefits of using Wikibase.cloud:
- It is a scalable and reliable platform that can meet the needs of any size Wikibase instance.
- It offers a number of security features to protect user data.
- It is easy to use, even for users with no prior experience with Wikibase.
If you are interested in using Wikibase.cloud, you can sign up for early access on the Wikibase.cloud website.
Bard, 24 March 2023
A very lengthy response, with some repetition, but generally accurate.
“Who operates Wikibase Cloud?”
Wikibase cloud is operated by Wikimedia Deutschland, a German non-profit organization that supports the Wikimedia projects, including Wikipedia. Wikimedia Deutschland is responsible for the development and maintenance of Wikibase.cloud, as well as for providing support to users.
Bard, 24 March 2023
“When was Wikibase Cloud first announced?”
Here Bard seemed to just reference today’s date, saying wikibase cloud was first announced on 24 March 2023, which is incorrect.
After telling Bard the date was wrong, it did a little better.
“That date is incorrect”
Here Bard manages to correct itself after discovering that Wikibase Cloud was announced at Wikidata on 2021.
Though there are a couple of different dates referred to in alternative responses, 28-30 October, and also 14th October…
I’m a little disappointed in Bard initially as it doesn’t appear to reference any sources for the information it is using. And it sometimes just refuses to answer questions even if it is capable.
In a second conversation I once again ask the question “What is wikibase cloud?”, which it previously failed to answer, but it now correctly responds…
I’m half convinced at some point I got a reference to a URL in a response too, but there doesn’t seem to be too much consistency in responses right now. And unlike the ChatGPT UI, there is no access to historical conversations.
I recently also wrote a post asking the Bing chat AI to answer while refering to Wikidata. Bard doesn’t reference it’s responses, but let’s see what happens if I ask for wikidata identifiers for Berlin and Antigua.
Here Bard manages to get the correct identifier for Berlin, I assume as it is generally referred to quite a lot in text out there on the internet.
However the Wikidata identifier that it provides for Antigua is actually that of Son Gokū, a protagonist from the Dragon ball franchise. The answer I was looking for would have been Q316390