Encyclopedia Britannica to Take User Contributions

Barence writes "Britannica has long been a vocal critic of Wikipedia's user-generated content, and has repeatedly attacked the accuracy of its articles. Surprisingly, then, it is rolling out a new system allowing readers to potentially contribute to articles, Wiki-style. But Britannica is keen to stress that its new website will not be following the Wiki-model, describing it 'as a collaborative process but not a democratic one.' You can try out the new Britannica beta site."

Comments

A grab for unpaid labor is all this is

[analog_line]

From the terms of service on the linked Britannica site:

By sending information or material, you automatically grant to Britannica, a royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive license to use, reproduce, modify, publish, edit, translate, distribute, perform, and display it alone or as part of other works in any form, media, or technology whether now known or hereafter developed, and to sublicense such rights through multiple tiers of sublicensees.

Wikipedia may have serious accuracy problems in a lot of areas (not all of coruse, but it's not hard to find them) but at least they aren't using me as unpaid labor to save them from having to hire researchers.

Encarta tried it

[Anonymous Coward]

Encarta already tried it.

It didn't work because it doesn't feel like you're collaborating and "owning" the submission, it feels like you're giving your time and effort to some large entity which has control over the content.

Clay Shirky explains it better in Here Comes Everybody but the basic idea is that WikiPedia belongs to the people who submit, in a way, which means people are more likely to.

Britannica misses the point,... again.

[nharmon]

But Britannica is keen to stress that its new website will not be following the Wiki-model, describing it "as a collaborative process but not a democratic one." First, Wikipedia is not a democracy.

Second, facts are not democratic. You can't VOTE on what will be true. Trust me, it's been tried.

First impressions

[consonant]

Waaay too much "rich content" for my tastes. When visiting a site for information, I, for one, do NOT want:

• Videos auto-running
• Random elements zooming around
• Mouseover actions that surprise (I still don't think mainstream WWW pages are ready for a http://www.dontclick.it/ - like UI)

This also sounds suspiciously a LOT like Google Knol. Encyclopaedia Britannica is reacting to Wikipedia the way Microsoft reacted to Google/Firefox. Giant established behemoth in its field getting its comeuppance from upstarts due to its inability to adapt to changing times, and trying to pick itself off the ground to play catch-up..