On Friday, Perplexity launched an election information hub that depends on knowledge from The Related Press and Democracy Works to offer dwell updates and details about the 2024 US basic election, which takes place on Tuesday, November 5.
“Beginning Tuesday, we’ll offer dwell updates on elections utilizing knowledge from The Related Press so you possibly can keep knowledgeable on presidential, senate, and home races at each a state and nationwide degree,” Perplexity wrote in a weblog put up. The location will pull knowledge from particular knowledge sources (referred to as APIs) hosted by the 2 organizations.
As of Monday, Perplexity’s hub at present gives interactive data on voting necessities, ballot instances, and summaries about poll measures, candidates, coverage positions, and endorsements. Customers can ask questions concerning the data just like utilizing a chatbot like ChatGPT.
A screenshot of the Perplexity election tracker chart interface.
Credit score:
Benj Edwards
Perplexity’s embrace of offering election data is an exception within the AI area. Cautious about unintentionally offering misinformation, competitor AI assistants from OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic at present direct customers elsewhere or decline to reply election questions. OpenAI’s ChatGPT Search directs election outcome queries to The Related Press and Reuters.
Accuracy considerations
Perplexity describes its new elections hub as “an entry level for understanding key points.” However like different AI fashions, Perplexity can produce confabulations (believable incorrect data) when producing responses. That would current an accuracy drawback as a result of the location’s Voter Information service makes use of AI language fashions to summarize and interpret data pulled from the online.