After 244 Years, Encyclopaedia Britannica Stops the Presses

[woodyear99]

When I am in my old age I can see myself telling the grandkids......"you know when I was your age we used these big printed books called encyclopedias.......Tommy stop watching holoporn!"

 http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/13/after-244-years-encyclopaedia-britannica-stops-the-presses/

After 244 Years, Encyclopaedia Britannica Stops the Presses

After 244 years, the Encyclopaedia Britannica is going out of print.Those coolly authoritative, gold-lettered reference books that were once sold door-to-door by a fleet of traveling salesmen and displayed as proud fixtures in American homes will be discontinued, company executives said.

In an acknowledgment of the realities of the digital age — and of competition from the Web site Wikipedia — Encyclopaedia Britannica will focus primarily on its online encyclopedias and educational curriculum for schools. The last print version is the 32-volume 2010 edition, which weighs 129 pounds and includes new entries on global warming and the Human Genome Project.“It’s a rite of passage in this new era,” Jorge Cauz, the president of Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc., a company based in Chicago, said in an interview. “Some people will feel sad about it and nostalgic about it. But we have a better tool now. The Web site is continuously updated, it’s much more expansive and it has multimedia.”

In the 1950s, having the Encyclopaedia Britannica on the bookshelf was akin to a station wagon in the garage or a black-and-white Zenith in the den, a possession coveted for its usefulness and as a goalpost for an aspirational middle class. Buying a set was often a financial stretch, and many families had to pay for it in monthly installments.But in recent years, print reference books have been almost completely overtaken by the Internet and its vast spread of resources, including specialized Web sites and the hugely popular — and free — online encyclopedia Wikipedia.

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[TriniXaeno]

the end of an era

those books were the cornerstone of my childhood.

bittersweet moment

[Eroo]

I actually thought they stopped printing a good few years now.

[SPK]

*resolves to keep my 1991 set at home intact*

So very sad in all, but it's just a sign of the times.

[Saxito Pau]

Never had Britannica, but my World Book and Collier's sets from the 80s still there in my living room.

[woodyear99]

This will probably happen to all printed encyclopedias eventually.

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[LQDSNK]

It is bittersweet, but it makes financial sense for all parties involved.

[Q]

Damn... That's all I can say, yes.

It's official: We're all old-ass men now. o_O

[woodyear99]

In the future ebooks will simply be called books hehe

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[Arcmanov]

Ha... You're as old as you feel.
Never had Britannica myself, but I appreciate the impact they had on learning.


Hmmm @ 'holoporn'... Now THERE'S something worth 'looking into'. 



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[TriniLink]

Same as Hard O/C, still got most of my Book of Knowledge set, at the age of 7 and up i was so versed in the set i could tell you about any topic down to the page number and paragraph, but now i blame gaming for my lack of memory. xD

[TriniXaeno]

@Q, agreed @ old.

lol @ gaming for lack of memory.

I wonder if there is any correlation?

I find my memory is less than stellar as well.

* TriniWyatt heads to google to investigate

hhahhaa @ Encarta CD. I used to love those encyclopedia discs. Thought those would have been the end of Britannica but instead the internet killed the CD/DVD and Hard Copy star.