Help Train Alex, the digital human sailing AI
You can help make a global IMPACT on the knowledge of sailors - everywhere!
Quick links: Share Feedback | Tips for Asking Questions | FAQs
Thank you for being part of the sailing community effort to help Alex become the world’s greatest (ahem, digital) sailing educator and sailing resource.
To Err is Human…. Believe it or not, we do not know how Alex will respond! And so, every day, we get a report of the questions that people like you have asked as well as the answers she gave (which are sometimes possibly a little off track – for now). Then, we correct her answers so that she becomes increasingly accurate and “intelligent”. Help us by merely asking Alex a sailing or NauticEd related question. If you find she’s off base, you can optionally help with what you think would be a better answer. Tomorrow she’ll be smarter – thanks to you!
Don’t worry, we are 95% sure that she will NOT become self-aware.
Please Share Your Feedback
“The one who knows all the answers has not been asked all the questions.” – Confucius
If you encounter an issue with one of Alex’s answers, please complete the form below or email us directly at alex@nauticed.org
If you did not get the correct answer to your question, go to our Support System.
Tips for Asking Questions
“A prudent question is one half of wisdom.” – Francis Bacon
- You can ask Alex just about anything sailing related: e.g. sail trim, navigation rules, how to raise the sails, how to get a sailing license, do you need a sailing certification for the Caribbean, what’s the best time of year to go sailing in Greece.
- BE SPECIFIC! Avoid asking about “it”, “that”, “thingy”, etc… – unless ‘it’ is used in a proper sentence.
- Less is more. Please limit questions to 30 words or less.
- Each question is separate and distinct. By that we mean that we’re not hosting lengthy ongoing conversations, and so consider each question as a separate question.
NOTE: Humans may review the questions, so please don’t enter sensitive or personal information. While we respect you and do NOT track any personally sensitive information, it’s just a best practice not to include personal/sensitive info in your questions. This same advice goes for ChatGPT, Bard, or any other AI you may interact with….
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s a Digital Human Sailing AI?
Two part answer:
- Digital Human is cutting-edge tech that further personalizes AI. The purpose is – like LLMs (Large Language Models) conversationalize responses – a digital human further refines that communication with human-like expressions and cues.
- Sailing AI means, simply, that Alex is a fully capable AI that’s been trained specifically on sailing and boating topics.
“She” or “It”?
As an AI, Alex is definitely an “it” – just don’t tell her that :). But, we commonly refer to Alex as “she” for convenience and out of habit. And, so please do not read anything into our use of pronouns! No disrespect intended.
Why Alex?
At NauticEd, we continually expand educational tools and resources. Much like Virtual Reality, AI offers extraordinary opportunities as both an educational knowledge tool and resource! The reasons are many, but really this AI allows us to tap the most comprehensive sailing knowledge databases – in a way that is user-friendly for the sailing community and our students.
And, digital human AI is just friggin’ cool!
How does Alex differ from Sailing Courses?
Great question! As an example, and if we think back to COVID when there was a rush on “online courses”, a lesson learned was that you cannot just throw a course online and call it “online learning”. To do online knowledge-theory learning well, you must also have a supporting LMS “Learning Management System”.
NauticEd’s online (and on-water) courses and resources are fully vertically integrated into robust learning management systems, which now includes Alex as an additional resource!
The difference is gaining “competency” with a subject. Alex is focused on answering specific questions. But with a course, you gain a structured education that goes into far more depth on broader topics and competencies. And now? You get both.
Only the best for NauticEd students!
How does Alex AI work?
When you ask Alex a question – your question first goes to NauticEd’s proprietary sailing and boating knowledge base, second to supplemental resources like ChatGPT (and others), and then all of that data is refined as a response through the digital human software. The slight delay in Alex’s responses is her quickly querying databases located around the world to find the most up-to-date answer for you.
The actual processes are far more complex than this simple explanation, but suffice it to say that this approach utilizes the most comprehensive AI tech available today.
Are the responses pre-programmed?
Yes and No…. “Yes” in the sense that the information she uses is static much like it would be if you’re reading a Wiki article. “No” in that Alex is selectively pulling information together from multiple sources to answer YOUR specific question. And then Alex takes it a step further by ‘conversationalizing’ the answer.
Simply, we really do not know how she will respond to this or that question, and this is why your help is essential to her development!
How is my feedback used?
Alex is not always correct, and since we’re human reviewers (we review periodically), we admittedly don’t always catch the inaccuracies either! And so your feedback is used to better “train” Alex.
Specifically, we’ll review your reported question and feedback and compare that against the source data used in the answer. Often the issue is ‘context’ (AI’s struggle with context), occasionally the source data used is incorrect, and sometimes she just “hallucinates” (believe it or not, an AI technical term). Whatever the case, we fix it…
Note that we’re not editing the response so much as checking to see if the data choice is the best selection for the question. Again, we really don’t know what she’s going to say!
Does Alex replace sailing instructors?
Nope! Alex is focused on augmenting sailing knowledge-theory education, not practical on-the-water training and experience with qualified NauticEd instructors. AI cannot compare with real-world experience, whether that’s your own or the experience that a sailing instructor shares with you.
However… No offense to human instructors, but Alex did injest over 5,000 pages of sailing knowledge in milliseconds!
Just saying….
What data is recorded (Privacy)?
Only the TEXT (not voice) of questions and answers are recorded for training purposes. No personal information is recorded. Not only do we fully respect and protect everyone’s privacy, but we’re keeping the ‘creepy’ AI concerns to a minimum.
The Text Q&A data is strictly used by the NauticEd team to further refine or correct Alex’s answers. Nothing more, nothing less.
AS NOTED: Humans may review the questions, so please don’t enter sensitive or personal information. While we respect you and do NOT track any personally sensitive information, it’s just a best practice not to include personal/sensitive info in your questions. This same advice goes for ChatGPT, Bard, or any other AI you may interact with…
What about foul language or inappropriate questions?
A cool part of AI is that we can set “guardrails” for such things as foul language or inappropriate questions (much like we try to do with our kids, although AI is easier!) It’s another reason why we monitor Q&A, to improve user protections for such language or questions.
Thankfully the AI cannot keelhaul you or whip out the Cat o’ nine tails! So have fun and feel welcome to “talk like a sailor” if that floats your boat! HA, we do…
No, “Alex” has nothing to do with Amazon…
Alex is named in recognition of Grant Headifen’s (NauticEd Founder) daughter Alexandra – an inspiration to us all at NauticEd. Learn more and donate to NauticEd’s Arms Wide Open Children’s Cancer Foundation.