Slashdot Mirror


Merriam-Webster Launches Open Dictionary

sweganeer writes "Merriam-Webster just released Open Dictionary to better take and share the pulse of language through the Web. Of course, Webster's has long celebrated and conveyed language's evolution - unlike linguistic prescriptivists who fail to grasp that's just what language does; and - where I've compared entries - they've certainly done so in a more consistent, professional fashion than online amateurs have in recent years: might Open Dictionary - in conjunction with Webster's standard Online Dictionary - yield the best of authoritative (top-down) and organic (bottom-up), online lexicography?"

2 of 171 comments (clear)

  1. Does this mean... by Elrac · · Score: 5, Funny

    that now SlashDotters will no longer have an excuse for poor spelling in their posts?

    --
    When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called Rel
  2. attention mr "editor" by Clover_Kicker · · Score: 5, Funny

    > Of course, Webster's has long celebrated and conveyed
    > language's evolution - unlike linguistic prescriptivists who
    > fail to grasp that's just what language does; and - where I've
    > compared entries - they've certainly done so in a more
    > consistent, professional fashion than online amateurs have in
    > recent years: might Open Dictionary - in conjunction with
    > Webster's standard Online Dictionary - yield the best of
    > authoritative (top-down) and organic (bottom-up), online
    > lexicography?"

    Tip for the day - no sentence should have 70 words in it.