Can Wolfram Alpha live up to the Hype?

Check out Wolfram Alpha’s latest Screencast featuring 13 minutes of example queries and results.

They’re webcasting the Launch

Well that’s something different. I can already imagine Wolfram trending on Twitter this Friday May 15 with links sending people to the live stream or the Wolfram page.

What IS/ISN’T Wolfram Alpha?

What it isn’t:

• A “Google Killer”.The Wolfram Alpha database is not an index of webpage and files on the internet.
• A promise to make the web completely “semantic”. Although I’m sure the ability to use natural language commands for search has been an integral part of the project, it can only be used (for now) within the parameters of their database.

What it is:

• A tool to compute data using innovative perspectives.
• A place to find real-time and historical data covering a great deal of topics.
• A large scale demo of Wolfram’s other software, Mathematica.

What it could be:

• A very useful mobile application.
• A partial substitute for Wikipedia.
• A game changer in politics. The economic, health, science, and _____ comparisons we’ll be able to make will help us view national and international issues from a different perspective.
• The beginning of Web 3.0.

Screenshots of the Screencast

Interesting correlation: It knows DNA too!

An incomplete list of what Wolfram Alpha can do

What’s your take on Wolfram Alpha? Will you use it? What improvements would you like to see?