AI Knowledge Tool Sphere For Wikipedia by Meta

July 29, 2022

Given how much criticism Meta gets for perpetuating misinformation, it is no surprise the company is putting effort into a cutting-edge, open source tool to test the veracity of information online. It is puzzling, though, that the company has no plans to use the tool on Facebook, Instagram, or Messenger, at least not yet. We learn from TechCrunch, “Meta Launches Sphere, an AI Knowledge Tool Based on Open Web Content, Used Initially to Verify Citations on Wikipedia.” The article includes a very brief video illustrating Sphere at work. Reporter Ingrid Lunden also discusses how Wikipedia will use the tool and the relationship between the two companies, so see the write-up for those details. We find this part interesting:

“Meta believes that the ‘white box’ knowledge base that Sphere represents has significantly more data (and by implication more sources to match for verification) than a typical ‘black box’ knowledge sources out there that are based on findings from, for example, proprietary search engines. ‘Because Sphere can access far more public information than today’s standard models, it could provide useful information that they cannot,’ it noted in a blog post.”

Ah, but is bigger really better? Not necessarily. Lunden continues:

“By open sourcing this tool, Meta’s argument is that it’s a more solid foundation for AI training models and other work than any proprietary base. All the same, it concedes the very foundations of the knowledge are potentially shaky, especially in these early days. What if a ‘truth’ is simply not being reported as widely as misinformation is? That’s where Meta wants to focus its future efforts in Sphere. ‘Our next step is to train models to assess the quality of retrieved documents, detect potential contradictions, prioritize more trustworthy sources — and, if no convincing evidence exists, concede that they, like us, can still be stumped,’ it noted.”

That is not ominous at all. Left unmentioned are issues of bias, which tend to be worse the more open a data set is. Will Wikipedia eventually come to regret pairing up with the Zuckbook?

Cynthia Murrell, July 28, 2022

Written by Stephen E. Arnold · Filed Under AI, Facebook, News

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Stephen E. Arnold monitors search, content processing, text mining and related topics from his high-tech nerve center in rural Kentucky. He tries to winnow the goose feathers from the giblets. He works with colleagues worldwide to make this Web log useful to those who want to go "beyond search". Contact him at sa [at] arnoldit.com. His Web site with additional information about search is arnoldit.com.