Wikipedia And Britannica Go After Each Other’s Business Models

The Britannica Encyclopaedia, the well respected 250 year old scholarly resource, and Wikipedia, its sloppy but more comprehensive online equivalent, are trying to move in on each other’s turf. 

Britannica is looking to meet the demands of the digital age by launching a new section on their website next week, which will enable users to contribute and edit entries, much like the Wikipedia platform. But there is one key difference – Britannica’s version will be strictly edited and monitored.

With the new section of the Britannica website, academics as well as amateur writers “who know a lot” will both be able to submit articles online, with a robust footnoted history attached to each article. Other features Britannica has planned to introduce over the next six months include a list of contributors indexed by subject area, an article rating system, and a response and question area for users.

As the longest running encyclopedia brand in England, Britannica doesn’t think much of Wikipedia’s methods. Their president, Jorge Cauz, said: “We’re not trying to be a wiki – that’s the last thing we want to be. Wikipedia contributes to the spread of information and many people are happy with it as their only source of reference – as are many people happy to eat McDonalds every day.” 

But while Britannica is no longer selling its books door to door, Wikipedia has conversely been moving into print, presumably trying to conjure some fusty academic respect. In September 2008, they partnered with Bertelsmann, a German based media corporation, to publish a single-volume print edition of Wikipedia’s German content. Less than one per cent of German Wikipedia content was included in the text, and entries in the publication mostly focused on the short definitions at the beginning of Wikipedia articles, so in comparison to the extensive Britannica, the print Wikipedia falls short. 

Britannica is not Wikipedia’s only competition though, just its most valiant thus far. Google launched it’s own online encyclopedia Knol in July 2008, but it hasn’t really caught on yet, despite a tie in with the how-to website Dummies.com.

So will Britannica, the ancient giver of knowledge, equal or surpass the democratic yet unreliable Wikipedia? A quick test: Britannica may be a highly reputable source of information, but does it have a section on Oolong the Pancake Rabbit? No.

Posted by Trista Orchard in Creative Economy | January 30, 2009 1:07PM |