"The computer has more or less made the print encyclopedias obsolete. Because what you can get now with the computer is for a fraction of the price you can get all of this information. You can get it updated via Internet downloads so your encyclopedia is always fresh. That's something you couldn't do with a print encyclopedia."
Gary Alt... editor in chief of Microsoft's Encarta. Microsoft has beaten World Book and Britannica hands down in the digital world... capturing about 65 percent of the multimedia encyclopedia market worldwide. As for the new edition of the Encarta Reference Library...
"Encarta is no longer just an encyclopedia, it's a whole suite of reference products. It's an encyclopedia, it's a world class atlas, it a dictionary, thesaurus, translation dictionary is new for this year, a suite of homework tools... it's a complete reference library now. It's grown from about seven million words to over forty four million words over the span of about ten years."
The price... about seventy five dollars. The DVD version is the best option to avoid swapping discs... and includes added features. I'm not sold on the idea of needing to buy a new edition every year... but with all that has taken place to change the world we live in... this year is certainly an exception. Bloomberg Boot Camp, I'm Fred Fishkin.