The startup to take on Wikipedia

“We are out to build the next place for canonical knowledge on the Internet” - Jude Gomila, Founder at Golden

This is the optimistic idea behind Golden, a Wikipedia alternative for billions of niche topics, companies, technologies and futuristic concepts.

This is a big undertaking. Wikipedia has been around for the past 18 years (yes, we looked this up on Wikipedia) and is known across the internet as an amazing resource for information. Naturally, Golden's launch had some mixed reactions:

“I feel the two greatest advantages this website will have over Wikipedia are the accessibility and reliability.” - Daniel

“Wikipedia is a non-profit which has democratized knowledge for millions of people - why would you want to compete with that?” - Nick

“There is a ton of potential here. I much prefer this UX to the Wiki UX. I have always had a problem with how Wikipedia updated its content.” - Zaigham

“Looks like a smarter Wikipedia (both for readers and editors). Plus a real business model so you don't have to bother people for money all the time. I can imagine Golden making a huge positive impact on society.” - Nathan

The business model: Golden will be free to use, but the startup plans to make money by charging large companies who want more advanced queries and AI tools for their own data. The company has also raised a $5M seed round.

The problem with Wikipedia: Jude cites that the issue with Wikipedia is its “arbitrary notability threshold,” meaning topics pages are deleted for not being notable enough.

The Golden approach: Golden is kicking things off with topics like cell- and plant-based meats, cryptocurrency consensus mechanisms, microbiomes, artificial intelligence and startups. The company also wants to give contributors a more user-friendly UI. Folks can already embed videos, academic papers and other multimedia content onto Golden pages.

The long-term mission: Golden wants to cover over 10 billion topics over time, and plans to use AI to help in its curation of information.

Add your thoughts and questions about Golden here.

When a customer calls, Google will now answer the phone. Check it out. ☎️