Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
David Goodman wrote: I would very much liketo take Wps redirect and disam system and rationalize it. the first step would be to change the policy so the full form of the name, including middle names, are always used when available. The second is to add geographic designators for all local events and places and organizations below the national level. Well, I suppose adding a category to redirects from names in standard form could definitely be done now; and it would be possible (?) to make it a Preferences option to display standard form names as article titles. As for rationalisation of dab pages, the MOSDAB people constantly work on this. I have reservations, certainly, because (unlike the redirect case) the idea that a dab page is solely for shunting people on to another page strikes me as ideological rather than in the best interests of the encyclopedia. Charles ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Ian Woollard wrote: On 30/03/2009, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: And then someone will come up with a better way of delivering information than a wiki... Probably, but I think people, if they still live, will still be talking about the wikipedia in a thousand years, like they still talk about the Library of Alexandria. Ha, hyperbolic optimism, I trust, otherwise perhaps the delusions of a very true believer [note to self - avoid koolaid cliché] The Library of Alexandria was with us for between 350 and a thousand years (depending on which history book you read), Wikipedia has been with us for a total of 8. Now, I don't want to underestimate the achievements of Wikipedia, however, Encarta (1993-2009)has had a longer run, and was part of an equally ground-breaking genre of knowledge provision at its start. I do suspect that Wikipedia will be cited in future histories as a significant example of a collaborative community. It will be to online libraries as E-bay is currently to online auctions. Whether wikipedia will prove to be a significant milestone in the collection and dissemination of knowledge, remains to be seen. It rather depends on what the next generation brings, and whether it will owe a recognisable debt to Wikipedia, or whether it will take us in another direction altogether. (If, for example, global copright laws were to change, the future might look more like wikisource - a library - than wikipedia, an encyclopedia.) Further, I'm no historian of technology. But the lesson surely is that not much lasts for long. Few organisations have been able to dominate any field for more than a decade or so. (Microsoft is perhaps the (dis?)honourable exception - and even then.) Today's unassailable phenomena, which no one can see anyone displacing, is tomorrow's footnote. BASIC anyone? Sinclair? Plastic records? The other reason I suspect that Wikipedia's shelf-life will, in fact, be shorter than most imagine, is that in the fast-changing evolution that is the internet, the ability to adapt is critical to survival. The browser that doesn't update is history. Sadly, for a relatively young phenomenon, Wikipedia, and particularly en.wp has shown an enormous conservatism about adapting. An initial winning formula that gave the breakthrough is regarded as sacred dogma - and a demand for consensus before change gives the dinosaurs an advantage. At the moment it matters little, as there is no real competition. But if/when a competitor get the magic formula right, I doubt Wikipedia has the structures to compete. The community hasn't really woken up to the fact that Wikipedia is no longer only an open shelf needing to be stacked, but it is a depository of a huge wealth of material that needs to be protected, sorted and (urgently) sifted. Alexandria's library didn't fail because it stopped importing knowledge, it failed because it was unable to effectively protect the knowledge it had already acquired. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 9:31 AM, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: snip Further, I'm no historian of technology. Read up on it - it is fascinating. But the lesson surely is that not much lasts for long. Some technologies endure, but just change. Telecommunications, for example. People will always want to communicate, and the telephone (for example) has changed a lot, but people will hopefully always want to talk to each other. Ditto pictures. The big revolutions in the future will likely be around the senses and how we feed input into them. Not quite brains in a box, but moving in that direction. Few organisations have been able to dominate any field for more than a decade or so. (Microsoft is perhaps the (dis?)honourable exception - and even then.) Today's unassailable phenomena, which no one can see anyone displacing, is tomorrow's footnote. BASIC anyone? Sinclair? Plastic records? Spotify? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spotify I've read that streaming online games and music will replace gaming consoles and iPods. Might well be true. But then the book has been resilient. The other reason I suspect that Wikipedia's shelf-life will, in fact, be shorter than most imagine, is that in the fast-changing evolution that is the internet, the ability to adapt is critical to survival. The browser that doesn't update is history. Sadly, for a relatively young phenomenon, Wikipedia, and particularly en.wp has shown an enormous conservatism about adapting. An initial winning formula that gave the breakthrough is regarded as sacred dogma - and a demand for consensus before change gives the dinosaurs an advantage. At the moment it matters little, as there is no real competition. But if/when a competitor get the magic formula right, I doubt Wikipedia has the structures to compete. Possibly there is no magic formula, only a lot of hard work. The community hasn't really woken up to the fact that Wikipedia is no longer only an open shelf needing to be stacked, but it is a depository of a huge wealth of material that needs to be protected, sorted and (urgently) sifted. Agreed. Though is it annoying when you see people working on things to address this, and then see critics, who inspired some people, carry on criticising the meta-processes, instead of supporting efforts made to improve those meta-processes. Cynicism on your part, maybe, but please don't infect people trying to change things. Alexandria's library didn't fail because it stopped importing knowledge, it failed because it was unable to effectively protect the knowledge it had already acquired. I thought it got ransacked? Goodness, they aren't even sure when or how it was destroyed! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_of_Alexandria#Destruction_of_the_Library Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 David Goodman dgoodma...@gmail.com: Britannica in its various incarnations and Encarta were excellent and useful reference works. Britannica remains useful. Encarta I think could have remained useful also. I really regret that we had a role in killing it. Why should we be pleased? The commercial organizations need to compete. We do not. The more encyclopedias the better. Oh totally agreed. I haven't used Encarta recently, but in its heyday (and my schooldays) it was a fantastic educational resource. I think it was also my first introduction to hypertext, and I suspect so for many others too. In fact for students at the time, I'd go so far as to say it was Microsoft's killer app. I think the challenge now is for Wikipedia to try and fill the gap it has made. Despite Encarta's disadvantages (cost, slow to update) it had excellent multimedia - something Wikipedia is sadly lacking in. Also its structured guides to topics were great, especially in the later versions. Pete / the wub ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
By plastic records do you mean vinyl ? Vinyl is what they are made from. They are still making new vinyl. You need to *not* go to some uptown shop and instead shop at the hard-code music stores. I have no idea why full price shops aren't selling vinyl anymore, but new vinyl is still coming out of the studios. Usually smaller, independents who are cutting demos and small runs of a thousand or whatever. Will Johnson **Feeling the pinch at the grocery store? Make dinner for $10 or less. (http://food.aol.com/frugal-feasts?ncid=emlcntusfood0001) ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com Today's unassailable phenomena, which no one can see anyone displacing, is tomorrow's footnote. BASIC anyone? Sinclair? Plastic records? [[Visual Basic .NET]]! ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 4:45 AM, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.comwrote: Agreed. Though is it annoying when you see people working on things to address this, and then see critics, who inspired some people, carry on criticising the meta-processes, instead of supporting efforts made to improve those meta-processes. Cynicism on your part, maybe, but please don't infect people trying to change things. There's change, and then there is the seeming of change. I don't think its cynical to oppose processes that appear to be helpful, but may actually set progress back. On the particular issue I assume you refer to, that Scott of all people opposes it should be a major cause for reflection on the part of those who support it. On the Library of Alexandria - the failure of a community to protect a knowledge resource is something that seems to take a form appropriate to the age. I don't think Wikipedia will find such a dramatic end, though; the problems we face are ultimately common ones. We're organized as an unlimited number of committees, and all the downfalls of governance by committee and direct democracy are thus multiplied. Even the founders of the U.S., as afraid as they were of the power of a monarch, understood the need for an executive leadership. Nathan ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 3:02 PM, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 4:45 AM, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.comwrote: Agreed. Though is it annoying when you see people working on things to address this, and then see critics, who inspired some people, carry on criticising the meta-processes, instead of supporting efforts made to improve those meta-processes. Cynicism on your part, maybe, but please don't infect people trying to change things. There's change, and then there is the seeming of change. I don't think its cynical to oppose processes that appear to be helpful, but may actually set progress back. On the particular issue I assume you refer to, that Scott of all people opposes it should be a major cause for reflection on the part of those who support it. You mean the poll? I've heard about that but haven't looked yet. That wasn't what I was talking about. I wasn't talking about the ideas I've been floating that aren't getting much attention because everyone is probably taking part in the debate surround that poll. I'm also very interested in the potential use of the new abuse filter to catch a lot of BLP-related vandalism. But it is remarkably difficult to centralise all this. I'm not going to repost the links I posted a few days ago, but one of them pointed to a list I made of a range of BLP-related pages that should be centralised and brought together. One of the reasons for inertia sometimes is splitting and spreading a debate too widely, and you end up with people repeating the same arguments and suggestions in different places. Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Carcharoth wrote: On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 9:31 AM, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: snip The community hasn't really woken up to the fact that Wikipedia is no longer only an open shelf needing to be stacked, but it is a depository of a huge wealth of material that needs to be protected, sorted and (urgently) sifted. Agreed. Though is it annoying when you see people working on things to address this, and then see critics, who inspired some people, carry on criticising the meta-processes, instead of supporting efforts made to improve those meta-processes. The proposition is like this: X is to WP as WP is to Encarta. Solve for X, both conceptually (as a visionary), and in practical terms (if there is a transition to manage, let's be the far-sighted ones ourselves). I suspect Douglas Adams did the first part. What people will want is something designed for display on a hand-held device. You summon up first short versions of our lead sections and then, instead of a long scroll, you get a menu with options like TOC, basic image, gallery, simple English, stable version, live version, 'see also... The inherent simplicity of article = single live webpage is an artefact of chunky great monitors. Charles ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Nathan wrote: On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 4:45 AM, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.comwrote: Agreed. Though is it annoying when you see people working on things to address this, and then see critics, who inspired some people, carry on criticising the meta-processes, instead of supporting efforts made to improve those meta-processes. Cynicism on your part, maybe, but please don't infect people trying to change things. There's change, and then there is the seeming of change. I don't think its cynical to oppose processes that appear to be helpful, but may actually set progress back. On the particular issue I assume you refer to, that Scott of all people opposes it should be a major cause for reflection on the part of those who support it. On the Library of Alexandria - the failure of a community to protect a knowledge resource is something that seems to take a form appropriate to the age. I don't think Wikipedia will find such a dramatic end, though; the problems we face are ultimately common ones. We're organized as an unlimited number of committees, and all the downfalls of governance by committee and direct democracy are thus multiplied. Even the founders of the U.S., as afraid as they were of the power of a monarch, understood the need for an executive leadership. Nathan ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On 31/03/2009, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: The Library of Alexandria was with us for between 350 and a thousand years (depending on which history book you read), Wikipedia has been with us for a total of 8. Yes, and it's been ranked about 8 on the entire freaking internet for a lot of that time! Things that happen relatively early on in the course of something (like the internet) tend to get 'frozen in' and have much longer life than you would expect they could have, google for example is not going away any time soon. When you look at the useful man-hours that have gone into the Wikipedia, and are still going in, it's on an upward trajectory that shows every sign of continuing for about another decade or more. Once you have a mass of information that big, it's not going away any time soon. It would take something really spectacular to eclipse it; machine summarisation might do it, but I suspect even the machines will be thumbing the wikipedia over to find out what's important and for a place to start their research ;-) -- -Ian Woollard We live in an imperfectly imperfect world. Life in a perfectly imperfect world would be *much* better. Life in an imperfectly perfect world would be pretty ghastly though. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 Ian Woollard ian.wooll...@gmail.com: On 31/03/2009, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: The Library of Alexandria was with us for between 350 and a thousand years (depending on which history book you read), Wikipedia has been with us for a total of 8. Yes, and it's been ranked about 8 on the entire freaking internet for a lot of that time! Things that happen relatively early on in the course of something (like the internet) tend to get 'frozen in' and have much longer life than you would expect they could have, google for example is not going away any time soon. Note that Google came from nowhere, by word of mouth, to become top search engine because of being much better than the other heavily-promoted search engines. Much like Wikipedia's rise to fame. (In image search, Google and all other search engines still suck. Here's to tagging coming to Commons.) It would take something really spectacular to eclipse it; machine summarisation might do it, but I suspect even the machines will be thumbing the wikipedia over to find out what's important and for a place to start their research ;-) Data on Wikipedia will tend to become more machine-readable. Templates are mostly a good idea. - d. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 5:57 PM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: snip (In image search, Google and all other search engines still suck. Here's to tagging coming to Commons.) Isn't that because people don't label, keyword or otherwise tag images properly? If they did, then Google would be able to find them and provide a good search facility. It might also be because lots of images are locked up in websites that only allow internal searches (though some are Google-able). It would take something really spectacular to eclipse it; machine summarisation might do it, but I suspect even the machines will be thumbing the wikipedia over to find out what's important and for a place to start their research ;-) Data on Wikipedia will tend to become more machine-readable. Templates are mostly a good idea. The worry there is that overuse of templates raises the barrier for humans to contribute. The trick is to harness the powers of both humans and machines, and make sure they work together and don't get in each other's way. But that's been the case all along, right from the start of the Machine Age, and onwards into the Information Age. Leave the grunt work to machines. Let humans do the clever stuff. Teach machines to approximate what humans do, or run on data and input from humans. The other worry is that humans coupled with machines can work at a rate that runs the human body into the ground. So you have to have things set up so the human can take a break and recharge itself. Less long sessions editing Wikipedia, and more targeted editing, adding more value-per-click (ugh, I can't believe I just said that). Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com: On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 5:57 PM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: (In image search, Google and all other search engines still suck. Here's to tagging coming to Commons.) Isn't that because people don't label, keyword or otherwise tag images properly? If they did, then Google would be able to find them and provide a good search facility. It might also be because lots of images are locked up in websites that only allow internal searches (though some are Google-able). General images on websites are only tagged by the file name and the surrounding text. Maybe the alt= text if they ever bother putting that on the page. Google's key 1998 innovation was noticing that good pages tend to be the ones linked to on a subject. This put them so far ahead of all other search engines they took over search. Without advertising themselves. With Commons, we're wanting a boolean category filter, to turn categories into tags that can be combined for queries. This solves the problem of minute subcategories like [[Category:Left-handed dead Jewish lesbian Presidents with argyria]] - all those attributes can be a category instead, and the minute subcategory a query. Data on Wikipedia will tend to become more machine-readable. Templates are mostly a good idea. The worry there is that overuse of templates raises the barrier for humans to contribute. The plumbing of templates is horrible, but the actual template interface is simple. Presumably WYSIWYG editing tools can be tweaked to make it a fill-in form more accessibly. - d. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
In a message dated 3/31/2009 9:58:16 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, dger...@gmail.com writes: (In image search, Google and all other search engines still suck. Here's to tagging coming to Commons.) Somewhere in my hazy memory I remember two projects I'd read about. There was a guy or a bunch of guys maybe who were trying to teach a computer how to recognize large expanses of flesh so it could find nude pictures I suppose. Then there was a human-tagging project where people ranked up points as they tagged images with whatever. I'm not clear how it worked, and I haven't heard of it for some years. There are some tasks that humans will always be better at than machines. That's probably why Google's image search sucks. But if I search for Brad Pitt Nude I still get several decent hits anyway. Will Johnson **Feeling the pinch at the grocery store? Make dinner for $10 or less. (http://food.aol.com/frugal-feasts?ncid=emlcntusfood0001) ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
In a message dated 3/31/2009 10:58:17 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, dger...@gmail.com writes: The plumbing of templates is horrible, but the actual template interface is simple. Presumably WYSIWYG editing tools can be tweaked to make it a fill-in form more accessibly. This would be the BOMB, the absolute frickin ultimate BOMB. (That means a good thing.) I hate long templates esp. because I can never remember the component names. So I tend to just stick to my old way of doing things and let others fancy it up later. Some templates (to my mind) are just utterly stupid. But if they came up as a form, that would certainly simplify everything. Let's start with Tables. They are... a... pain. A royal pain. Not just a normal commoner pain. If I want to use a table, I don't even try the Wiki-way, I just use HTML markup. Of course that generally means that no one ever updates my tables because they can't understand them. Will Johnson **Feeling the pinch at the grocery store? Make dinner for $10 or less. (http://food.aol.com/frugal-feasts?ncid=emlcntusfood0001) ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 11:45 PM, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: You realise, someday the announcement will read: Wikipedia has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional wiki encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. Civilisation proceeds obsolescence by obsolescence I'm fine with that - it's inevitable, and so far as I can think, only has three flavors- - Wikipedia subsumes into whatever may come in future, - Wikipedia becomes whatever may come in future (or specializes into some niche), - or Wikipedia is marginalized (and potentially killed off) by whatever may come in future. FT2 ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 wjhon...@aol.com: In a message dated 3/31/2009 10:58:17 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, dger...@gmail.com writes: The plumbing of templates is horrible, but the actual template interface is simple. Presumably WYSIWYG editing tools can be tweaked to make it a fill-in form more accessibly. This would be the BOMB, the absolute frickin ultimate BOMB. (That means a good thing.) I hate long templates esp. because I can never remember the component names. So I tend to just stick to my old way of doing things and let others fancy it up later. Some templates (to my mind) are just utterly stupid. But if they came up as a form, that would certainly simplify everything. Yeah. Current WYSIWYG editors either (a) sorta do a subset of actual wiki markup or (b) just fill the page with raw HTML. But I understand they're advancing. There's enough demand for them on corporate intranets and suchlike that you can be sure any WYSIWYG editor will be thoroughly debugged before it hits Wikimedia sites. - d. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 9:57 AM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: 2009/3/31 Ian Woollard ian.wooll...@gmail.com: On 31/03/2009, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: The Library of Alexandria was with us for between 350 and a thousand years (depending on which history book you read), Wikipedia has been with us for a total of 8. Yes, and it's been ranked about 8 on the entire freaking internet for a lot of that time! Things that happen relatively early on in the course of something (like the internet) tend to get 'frozen in' and have much longer life than you would expect they could have, google for example is not going away any time soon. Note that Google came from nowhere, by word of mouth, to become top search engine because of being much better than the other heavily-promoted search engines. Much like Wikipedia's rise to fame. None of the tools were that well promoted, really - Altavista had been a research experiment that Digital tried to capitalize on, and Yahoo was too stuck on directories / organizing and too little on content. PR as we know it was still very primitive on the net. But Google did rise by being better. -- -george william herbert george.herb...@gmail.com ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
The thing that sucked me away from Yahoo and over to Google was that Google actually crawled the net themselves. They did not rely on people submitting or knowing how to submit their pages. So if you just wait long enough, your page shows up. At least in theory. Remember when we used to submit pages to multiple search engines and some of them had very odd peculiarities about how to submit and how they'd index them. Bah! I'm fine with waiting to be indexed. Will Johnson ** Feeling the pinch at the grocery store? Make dinner for $10 or less. (http://food.aol.com/frugal-feasts?ncid=emlcntusfood0001) ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
The thing that sucked me away from Yahoo and over to Google was that Google actually crawled the net themselves. They did not rely on people submitting or knowing how to submit their pages. So if you just wait long enough, your page shows up. At least in theory. Remember when we used to submit pages to multiple search engines and some of them had very odd peculiarities about how to submit and how they'd index them. Bah! I'm fine with waiting to be indexed. Will Johnson You don't have to wait long. Both Googlebot and Yahoo Bot hit you like a ton of bricks after just a few days if there any links to your site. Fred ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 Peter Coombe thewub.w...@googlemail.com: I think the challenge now is for Wikipedia to try and fill the gap it has made. Wikipedia for schools is the best effort in that area. Wikipedia has never been very good at internally selecting subsections of wikipedia for best ofs and the like. Despite Encarta's disadvantages (cost, slow to update) it had excellent multimedia - something Wikipedia is sadly lacking in. I'm pretty sure we have more video and sound than Encarta ever did. Also its structured guides to topics were great, especially in the later versions. Wikipedia mostly does this through nav boxes. -- geni ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 wjhon...@aol.com: In a message dated 3/31/2009 9:58:16 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, dger...@gmail.com writes: (In image search, Google and all other search engines still suck. Here's to tagging coming to Commons.) Somewhere in my hazy memory I remember two projects I'd read about. There was a guy or a bunch of guys maybe who were trying to teach a computer how to recognize large expanses of flesh so it could find nude pictures I suppose. It sort of worked under some conditions but that is only one type of image. Then there was a human-tagging project where people ranked up points as they tagged images with whatever. I'm not clear how it worked, and I haven't heard of it for some years. There are some tasks that humans will always be better at than machines. That's probably why Google's image search sucks. But if I search for Brad Pitt Nude I still get several decent hits anyway. Problem is neither humans nor machines are very good at image tagging. Machines are obvious but lets look at humans. First problem is that your average human isn't an expert on everything. Unless you are interested in the early history of submarines you are going to have a hard time working out what this photo is of: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Smfirstholland.jpg and unless you are a real submarine nerd you will likely only know that because it is the pic everyone uses. Now you would hope that the uploaded would tag it. Problem there is that the unloader is only thinking about it in one context when it might usefully be tagged with additional things to over other contexts. -- geni ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 FT2 ft2.w...@gmail.com: I'm fine with that - it's inevitable, and so far as I can think, only has three flavors- - Wikipedia subsumes into whatever may come in future, - Wikipedia becomes whatever may come in future (or specializes into some niche), - or Wikipedia is marginalized (and potentially killed off) by whatever may come in future. You missed whatever comes next useing parts of wikipedia. Even if you weren't interested in wikipedia content would you really want to go to the effort of recreating wikipedia's redirect and disambiguation system? -- geni ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 FT2 ft2.w...@gmail.com: I'm fine with that - it's inevitable, and so far as I can think, only has three flavors- - Wikipedia subsumes into whatever may come in future, - Wikipedia becomes whatever may come in future (or specializes into some niche), - or Wikipedia is marginalized (and potentially killed off) by whatever may come in future. You missed whatever comes next useing parts of wikipedia. Even if you weren't interested in wikipedia content would you really want to go to the effort of recreating wikipedia's redirect and disambiguation system? -- geni Yeh, you would. It is not that good. It is inconsistent and fails to adequately define many terms because Wikipedia is not a dictionary and fails to provide appropriate external links because Wikipedia is not a web directory. Fred Bauder ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 Fred Bauder fredb...@fairpoint.net: Yeh, you would. It is not that good. It is inconsistent and fails to adequately define many terms because Wikipedia is not a dictionary and fails to provide appropriate external links because Wikipedia is not a web directory. Those are not something you want out of a redirect or disambiguation system. You want something that can tell the differences between cases like [[HMS Victory]] where it's safe to assume that people are talking about the one that was nelsons flagship and [[HMS Iron Duke]] where you are better off questioning further. You also want a system that highlights the key distinguishing features of whatever is being disambiguated. -- geni ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On 31/03/2009, Fred Bauder fredb...@fairpoint.net wrote: Yeh, you would. It is not that good. It is inconsistent and fails to adequately define many terms because Wikipedia is not a dictionary All encyclopedia articles are supposed to define their topic; they're just not supposed to define multiple topics as dictionaries do. Fred Bauder -- -Ian Woollard We live in an imperfectly imperfect world. Life in a perfectly imperfect world would be *much* better. Life in an imperfectly perfect world would be pretty ghastly though. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
I would very much liketo take Wps redirect and disam system and rationalize it. the first step would be to change the policy so the full form of the name, including middle names, are always used when available. The second is to add geographic designators for all local events and places and organizations below the national level. David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 6:23 PM, geni geni...@gmail.com wrote: 2009/3/31 Fred Bauder fredb...@fairpoint.net: Yeh, you would. It is not that good. It is inconsistent and fails to adequately define many terms because Wikipedia is not a dictionary and fails to provide appropriate external links because Wikipedia is not a web directory. Those are not something you want out of a redirect or disambiguation system. You want something that can tell the differences between cases like [[HMS Victory]] where it's safe to assume that people are talking about the one that was nelsons flagship and [[HMS Iron Duke]] where you are better off questioning further. You also want a system that highlights the key distinguishing features of whatever is being disambiguated. -- geni ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 11:51 PM, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonav...@gmail.com wrote: I think this casts a new interesting perspective on the decision by Microsoft to buy out powerset.com. I will be watching with interest, how they will develop that product, and whether they intend to incorporate it more extensively into their other product offerings. I have to admit I was skeptical initially when I heard powerset.com would be gobbled up. But should it turn out that Microsoft were to really seriously put effort into powerset.com, any relief Encyclopaedia Britannica may have gained from the reduction of competition for number two spot, may prove a little short lived. That is unless of course Microsoft/Powerset make some kind of deal with EB that they can use powersets semantic search engine on also EB product. Of course it is possible that MS have made the judgment that the whole sector is not good for them, but actually I would prefer to be hopeful that this means they would give more impetus to powerset now. I personally think powerset is currently the best interface for wikipedia, bar none. On the gripping hand, if developing powerset is not on the cards for Microsoft, perhaps now that they have decided to not hold onto encarta, they might be persuadable to sell powerset off, since holding on to it is not fending off a competitor to encarta. The question of course then would be, who would be willing to buy powerset off their hands? David Goodman replied: Britannica in its various incarnations and Encarta were excellent and useful reference works. Britannica remains useful. Encarta I think could have remained useful also. I really regret that we had a role in killing it. Why should we be pleased? The commercial organizations need to compete. We do not. The more encyclopedias the better. I think the answer is that we should be pleased that we became so much *more* useful. This is the _sentimentally_ sad, but logically *glorious* facet of competition as a concept. You won't find a world record holder in any sport that will not admit to a sadness when somebody surpasses theirs, and likely the fans of that particular sportsman will feel a pang in sympathy. But ask the sportsman squarely if they don't feel that their result being an inspiration for others to excel and surpass that result is and was a source of pride for them too, and I guarantee 99,9 % of record holders will say they genuinely thought their record was there to be broken, and as an inspiration for others to go faster, higher, stronger. Yours, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 8:39 PM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: [spotted by Mathias Schindler] http://encarta.msn.com/guide_page_FAQ/FAQ.html Important Notice: MSN Encarta to be Discontinued On October 31, 2009, MSN® Encarta® Web sites worldwide will be discontinued, with the exception of Encarta Japan, which will be discontinued on December 31, 2009. Additionally, Microsoft will cease to sell Microsoft Student and Encarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009. We understand that Encarta users may have questions regarding this announcement so we have prepared this list of questions and answers below. Please keep reading if you would like more information about these changes to Encarta. Encarta has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. I wonder what different ways they could be talking about? :-) we believe that we can use what we’ve learned and assets we’ve accrued with offerings like Encarta to develop future technology solutions So they might try making a comeback in another form? I liked Encarta - it was the first real encyclopedia I used. So I feel a bit torn here. Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Same here. This and the World Book Encyclopedia 2001 CD that I still have. I did like taking the quizzes Encarta had on their site. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote: From: Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 3:34 PM On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 8:39 PM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: [spotted by Mathias Schindler] http://encarta.msn.com/guide_page_FAQ/FAQ.html Important Notice: MSN Encarta to be Discontinued On October 31, 2009, MSN® Encarta® Web sites worldwide will be discontinued, with the exception of Encarta Japan, which will be discontinued on December 31, 2009. Additionally, Microsoft will cease to sell Microsoft Student and Encarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009. We understand that Encarta users may have questions regarding this announcement so we have prepared this list of questions and answers below. Please keep reading if you would like more information about these changes to Encarta. Encarta has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. I wonder what different ways they could be talking about? :-) we believe that we can use what we’ve learned and assets we’ve accrued with offerings like Encarta to develop future technology solutions So they might try making a comeback in another form? I liked Encarta - it was the first real encyclopedia I used. So I feel a bit torn here. Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Indeed it will, and hopefully that wiki will have worked out the kinks we haven't managed to fix. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: From: doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 3:45 PM You realise, someday the announcement will read: Wikipedia has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional wiki encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. Civilisation proceeds obsolescence by obsolescence ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
And then someone will come up with a better way of delivering information than a wiki... Scientia Potentia est wrote: Indeed it will, and hopefully that wiki will have worked out the kinks we haven't managed to fix. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: From: doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 3:45 PM You realise, someday the announcement will read: Wikipedia has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional wiki encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. Civilisation proceeds obsolescence by obsolescence ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Ad infinitum...you have to love it. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: From: doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 3:58 PM And then someone will come up with a better way of delivering information than a wiki... Scientia Potentia est wrote: Indeed it will, and hopefully that wiki will have worked out the kinks we haven't managed to fix. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: From: doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 3:45 PM You realise, someday the announcement will read: Wikipedia has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional wiki encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. Civilisation proceeds obsolescence by obsolescence ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 12:15 AM, geni geni...@gmail.com wrote: 2009/3/30 doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com: You realise, someday the announcement will read: Wikipedia has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional wiki encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. Civilisation proceeds obsolescence by obsolescence That would require whatever the replacement is to turn up before the cost of hosting wikipedia becomes trivial and software agents that can write the thing without human involvement have become widespread. In fact if I had to put a guess on what will replace wikipedia is will be made to order articles generated on the fly from a wide range of sources by software. Hmm. Can you get $$$ from that? me dreams about making fortune from this Some Wikipedia mirrors seem to be trying to do this already. Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 12:22 AM, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote: On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 12:15 AM, geni geni...@gmail.com wrote: snip In fact if I had to put a guess on what will replace wikipedia is will be made to order articles generated on the fly from a wide range of sources by software. Hmm. Can you get $$$ from that? me dreams about making fortune from this Some Wikipedia mirrors seem to be trying to do this already. To clarify: I mean those sites that offer a range of articles on a topic. Content aggregators, including Wikipedia articles and others (often better). Answers.com is an example. http://www.answers.com/Pope%20John%20Paul%20II Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
On 30/03/2009, doc doc.wikipe...@ntlworld.com wrote: And then someone will come up with a better way of delivering information than a wiki... Probably, but I think people, if they still live, will still be talking about the wikipedia in a thousand years, like they still talk about the Library of Alexandria. -- -Ian Woollard I've always compared it to the Platonic Academy as a milestone in intellectual history. Quite a revolution from Lexus-Nexus... Fred Bauder ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
I think you hit the nail on one $$$-making venture. Child-safe Wikipedia. Parents or schools pay for a child-safe version (G rated) for elementary school, and maybe PG-rated for secondary school. Who knows maybe even religious colleges would pay for an R-rated version ? Will I thought of it first Johnson ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
2009/3/31 Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com: Hmm. Can you get $$$ from that? me dreams about making fortune from this The technology isn't there yet and when it is you will likely hit the problem that rather a lot of other people will also be able to do it. Some Wikipedia mirrors seem to be trying to do this already. Not in the way I meant. -- geni ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
I just took one of those quizzes. I think a 1/5 is bad, right? X! On Mar 30, 2009, at 6:36 PM [Mar 30, 2009 ], Scientia Potentia est wrote: Same here. This and the World Book Encyclopedia 2001 CD that I still have. I did like taking the quizzes Encarta had on their site. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote: From: Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 3:34 PM On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 8:39 PM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: [spotted by Mathias Schindler] http://encarta.msn.com/guide_page_FAQ/FAQ.html Important Notice: MSN Encarta to be Discontinued On October 31, 2009, MSN® Encarta® Web sites worldwide will be discontinued, with the exception of Encarta Japan, which will be discontinued on December 31, 2009. Additionally, Microsoft will cease to sell Microsoft Student and Encarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009. We understand that Encarta users may have questions regarding this announcement so we have prepared this list of questions and answers below. Please keep reading if you would like more information about these changes to Encarta. Encarta has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. I wonder what different ways they could be talking about? :-) we believe that we can use what we’ve learned and assets we’ve accrued with offerings like Encarta to develop future technology solutions So they might try making a comeback in another form? I liked Encarta - it was the first real encyclopedia I used. So I feel a bit torn here. Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Fear the power of freedom On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 12:39 PM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: [spotted by Mathias Schindler] http://encarta.msn.com/guide_page_FAQ/FAQ.html Important Notice: MSN Encarta to be Discontinued On October 31, 2009, MSN® Encarta® Web sites worldwide will be discontinued, with the exception of Encarta Japan, which will be discontinued on December 31, 2009. Additionally, Microsoft will cease to sell Microsoft Student and Encarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009. We understand that Encarta users may have questions regarding this announcement so we have prepared this list of questions and answers below. Please keep reading if you would like more information about these changes to Encarta. - d. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l -- Whether you can or can't, any way you are correct. - Henry Ford ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Depends on what it's about. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, Soxred93 soxre...@gmail.com wrote: From: Soxred93 soxre...@gmail.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 6:37 PM I just took one of those quizzes. I think a 1/5 is bad, right? X! On Mar 30, 2009, at 6:36 PM [Mar 30, 2009 ], Scientia Potentia est wrote: Same here. This and the World Book Encyclopedia 2001 CD that I still have. I did like taking the quizzes Encarta had on their site. bibliomaniac15 --- On Mon, 3/30/09, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote: From: Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Date: Monday, March 30, 2009, 3:34 PM On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 8:39 PM, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote: [spotted by Mathias Schindler] http://encarta.msn.com/guide_page_FAQ/FAQ.html Important Notice: MSN Encarta to be Discontinued On October 31, 2009, MSN® Encarta® Web sites worldwide will be discontinued, with the exception of Encarta Japan, which will be discontinued on December 31, 2009. Additionally, Microsoft will cease to sell Microsoft Student and Encarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009. We understand that Encarta users may have questions regarding this announcement so we have prepared this list of questions and answers below. Please keep reading if you would like more information about these changes to Encarta. Encarta has been a popular product around the world for many years. However, the category of traditional encyclopedias and reference material has changed. People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past. I wonder what different ways they could be talking about? :-) we believe that we can use what we’ve learned and assets we’ve accrued with offerings like Encarta to develop future technology solutions So they might try making a comeback in another form? I liked Encarta - it was the first real encyclopedia I used. So I feel a bit torn here. Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
David Gerard wrote: [spotted by Mathias Schindler] http://encarta.msn.com/guide_page_FAQ/FAQ.html Important Notice: MSN Encarta to be Discontinued On October 31, 2009, MSN® Encarta® Web sites worldwide will be discontinued, with the exception of Encarta Japan, which will be discontinued on December 31, 2009. Additionally, Microsoft will cease to sell Microsoft Student and Encarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009. We understand that Encarta users may have questions regarding this announcement so we have prepared this list of questions and answers below. Please keep reading if you would like more information about these changes to Encarta. - d. I think this casts a new interesting perspective on the decision by Microsoft to buy out powerset.com. I will be watching with interest, how they will develop that product, and whether they intend to incorporate it more extensively into their other product offerings. I have to admit I was skeptical initially when I heard powerset.com would be gobbled up. But should it turn out that Microsoft were to really seriously put effort into powerset.com, any relief Encyclopaedia Britannica may have gained from the reduction of competition for number two spot, may prove a little short lived. That is unless of course Microsoft/Powerset make some kind of deal with EB that they can use powersets semantic search engine on also EB product. Of course it is possible that MS have made the judgment that the whole sector is not good for them, but actually I would prefer to be hopeful that this means they would give more impetus to powerset now. I personally think powerset is currently the best interface for wikipedia, bar none. On the gripping hand, if developing powerset is not on the cards for Microsoft, perhaps now that they have decided to not hold onto encarta, they might be persuadable to sell powerset off, since holding on to it is not fending off a competitor to encarta. The question of course then would be, who would be willing to buy powerset off their hands? Yours, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Microsoft kills Encarta
Britannica in its various incarnations and Encarta were excellent and useful reference works. Britannica remains useful. Encarta I think could have remained useful also. I really regret that we had a role in killing it. Why should we be pleased? The commercial organizations need to compete. We do not. The more encyclopedias the better. David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 11:51 PM, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonav...@gmail.com wrote: David Gerard wrote: [spotted by Mathias Schindler] http://encarta.msn.com/guide_page_FAQ/FAQ.html Important Notice: MSN Encarta to be Discontinued On October 31, 2009, MSN® Encarta® Web sites worldwide will be discontinued, with the exception of Encarta Japan, which will be discontinued on December 31, 2009. Additionally, Microsoft will cease to sell Microsoft Student and Encarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009. We understand that Encarta users may have questions regarding this announcement so we have prepared this list of questions and answers below. Please keep reading if you would like more information about these changes to Encarta. - d. I think this casts a new interesting perspective on the decision by Microsoft to buy out powerset.com. I will be watching with interest, how they will develop that product, and whether they intend to incorporate it more extensively into their other product offerings. I have to admit I was skeptical initially when I heard powerset.com would be gobbled up. But should it turn out that Microsoft were to really seriously put effort into powerset.com, any relief Encyclopaedia Britannica may have gained from the reduction of competition for number two spot, may prove a little short lived. That is unless of course Microsoft/Powerset make some kind of deal with EB that they can use powersets semantic search engine on also EB product. Of course it is possible that MS have made the judgment that the whole sector is not good for them, but actually I would prefer to be hopeful that this means they would give more impetus to powerset now. I personally think powerset is currently the best interface for wikipedia, bar none. On the gripping hand, if developing powerset is not on the cards for Microsoft, perhaps now that they have decided to not hold onto encarta, they might be persuadable to sell powerset off, since holding on to it is not fending off a competitor to encarta. The question of course then would be, who would be willing to buy powerset off their hands? Yours, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
