The End of an Era for The Encyclopaedia Britannica

The End of an Era for The Encyclopaedia Britannica The End of an Era for â€Å"The Encyclopaedia Britannica† The End of an Era for â€Å"The Encyclopaedia Britannica† By Mark Nichol The Encyclopaedia Britannica, for two and a half centuries considered in the public eye the reigning resource for scholarly research, recently announced that it was ceasing publication in print and would henceforth be available only in electronic form. As usual, the doddering dinosaur is behind the curve. The company had had the chance to go high-tech in 1985 with a Microsoft partnership; somewhat understandably, it declined to partner with the then fledgling software company which released its Encarta, its own, successful, encyclopedia on CD-ROM in 1993. The Encyclopedia Britannica company did launch a CD-ROM in 1989, four years before Encarta came along, but it did so under the name of Compton’s, another encyclopedia brand it owned, so as not to tarnish the venerable Britannica brand. That product, which received positive reviews, was nevertheless not the first computer-based encyclopedia; Grolier’s had come out with a DOS version in 1985. Britannica’s print encyclopedia continued to dominate the market even after Grolier’s innovation, of course, because the proportion of prospective encyclopedia customers who desired a high-tech version was very small. However, six years after Britannica’s revenues peaked in 1990, it declared bankruptcy (though it was bought by a Swiss businessman and survives but barely to this day). People, it seems, were just not buying print encyclopedias like they used to. And why bother? The Encyclopaedia Britannica, though a formidable feat of scholarship, had long been overhyped. It was certainly always impressive looking and still is: The final print edition, published in 2010 and still for sale (â€Å"while supplies last!†), consists of forty-four million words packed into thirty-two volumes. It has, however, long been mostly a prestige product, meant to be admired by visitors to one’s home who marvel at the sophistication of parents who would spend four figures to be sure that their children have nothing but the best trove of knowledge at their fingertips. (The 2010 edition retails for about $1,400.) But those fingertips, it seems, rarely touched the meticulously prepared, exhaustively researched encyclopedia; one survey determined that few customers consulted it more than once a year. For many, it was just another feature of home decor, another mark of status. Britannica Online and the DVD version are presumably more well thumbed, and several years ago, Britannica announced plans to develop a content model more along the lines of Wikipedia, in which the public would be able to submit new content to Britannica or revise existing content, although it would be clearly distinguished from content produced by Britannica’s staff and scholarly contributors. (A cursory examination of Britannica’s website shows no reference to such content, however.) What does the epochal end of Britannica’s presence in print mean for writers, editors, and editorial researchers and fact-checkers? You tell me when was the last time you cracked the spine of The Encyclopaedia Britannica? For many years, we have been able to go straight to the (online) source for a great deal of information, checking information against government, business, and organizational websites. And when we want objective information, we consult news sites, and online compendia like Wikipedia. And though I note in this post that Wikipedia is regrettably inferior to The Encyclopaedia Britannica in writing quality, is was found in a study to be essentially just as accurate – that is, highly, but not flawlessly, accurate. Print publications just can’t compete with online sources for immediacy. If you want to know the state of knowledge or attitudes about a particular phenomenon in 1912, certainly, you can hunt for the eleventh edition of The Encyclopaedia Britannica and enlighten yourself. But new editions necessarily take years to produce, whereas websites can be updated on demand. History books, in whatever perhaps unbooklike form they may take in the future, will note this period as a significant turning point in information production, processing, and retrieval. In the meantime, we’re living in the transition; I still read many books, but I read not just research online extensively, too. (And I rarely touch a print magazine or newspaper.) We must be nimble and accept the future with good grace. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the General category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Masters Degree or Master's Degree?50 Latin Phrases You Should Know5 Erroneously Constructed â€Å"Not Only . . . But Also† Sentences

The Bitter Truth about Betty Botter You’re Not Thinking Straight

The Bitter Truth about Betty Botter You’re Not Thinking Straight Can you say this tongue twister 10x fast? Betty Botter bought some butter, â€Å"But,† she said, â€Å"This butter’s bitter! If I put it in my batter, It will make my batter bitter!† So she bought some better butter, Put it in her bitter batter, Made her bitter batter better. I learned this one from my mother when I was young, and I always thought it was an easy one to roll off the tongue. I also thought it was cute and logical. I always enjoyed tongue twisters growing up, and even got to perform one (Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers) when I was on Sesame Street as a kid. Yes that was a moment of fame and glory! Stopping to Think I never really delved into the meaning of a given tongue twister. But on my recent trip to visit family in Austin, the Betty Botter rhyme came into my wandering mind after some talk with my mom about bats and batters- and I realized there’s a gaping logical hole in the poem. Here’s the question: How did the batter get bitter if Betty Botter never put the bitter butter in her batter in the first place? I went straight to my mom with my question. Surely, I thought, I must be remembering the words wrong! There must be a line I was missing! But mom confirmed that I remembered the words just as she had passed them down to me- and she admitted that she, too, had missed the gap in logic in the verse. Next stop Google. Perhaps mom had learned an incomplete version of the poem? Here’s what I found on Wikipedia as the full text: Betty Botter bought some butter; â€Å"But,† said she, â€Å"this butter’s bitter! If I put it in my batter It will make my batter bitter. But a bit o’ better butter Will but make my batter better.† Then she bought a bit o’ butter Better than the bitter butter, Made her bitter batter better. So ’twas better Betty Botter Bought a bit o’ better butter. While this version is longer and a bit of a better tongue twister, it by no means solved the problem that Betty never put that bitter butter in her batter! And while I did find one version that had a line, â€Å"The butter Betty Botter bought was a bit bitter / And made her batter bitter,† this version was clunky and contrived. Sigh†¦ We Are Gullible How many things like this are there in our lives? How easy is it for someone, or for the media, to trick us with a clever gimmick into accepting something as reasonable or logical that simply makes no sense? I’m reminded of the well-known joke that goes something like this: What’s the opposite of least? Most. What do you call a person who throws a party? The host. What’s another word for seashore? Coast. What’s another word for brag? Boast. What do you call a dead person who comes back to life? A ghost. What do you put in a toaster? Toast. Oops. You don’t put toast in a toaster. The correct answer is â€Å"bread.† Or maybe â€Å"a bagel.† Back to Google. I put â€Å"what do you put in a toaster joke† into my search bar and was gifted with multiple lists of jokes that made me feel like an idiot when I read them. I was hoping for some brain science around these types of jokes, but came up empty except for one suggestion that brain training can be accomplished without the help of Luminosity.com. Read, Think and Listen Carefully Mostly I am reminded by all these examples to pay attention. To listen carefully and closely, and as much as possible, not to accept things at face value. This is easier said than done, and I know I will miss important subtleties and inconsistencies more often than I would like to predict. And in the meantime, I will leave you with this: A plane crashes fatally on the border of the United States and Canada. Where do they bury the survivors? Answer: First of all, it sounds like there were no survivors. But even if there were, you do not bury survivors. They are alive.

Analyze Lucy in Disgrace by comparing her to Lucy in William Research Paper

Analyze Lucy in Disgrace by comparing her to Lucy in William Wordsworth's The Lucy Poems. Explain at least three signi - Research Paper Example The work also dwells on themes of violence and exploitation and the indelible and tormenting lacerations they leave on the victims as well as the perpetrators. David, a professor, teaching communication in a technical university in South Africa, makes sexual advances on a vulnerable female student. He refuses to apologize and is sacked by the college authorities and he comes to his daughter Lucy’s farm to live with her. As he begins to adapt to the farming life, a gang of three black men launch an attack on the farm, beats him up and rapes his daughter. Ironically, the same callous treatment that he metes out on the women in his life rebounds on his daughter and he remains helpless, unable even to protect his daughter’s honor. The story, through the depiction of the lead character Lucy, thus portrays women as hapless subjects of male prowess and domination, which reduce them to the status of emotional wrecks. On the other hand, â€Å"Lucy,† a set of five poems wr itten by Wordsworth, an acclaimed English poet, tells the story of an unrequited love of an anonymous narrator for Lucy, an anonymous and undefined character. Contrary to the Lucy in the novel, the poems view Lucy in an entirely different perspective by objectifying her as a symbol of beauty and innocence. She represents the deep yearning and longing of the young male narrator’s unquenched heart. ... On the other hand, in â€Å"Disgrace,† Coetzee clearly provides the idea as to who Lucy is, what her conflict is and how she perceives herself as a part of the South African society and the perspectives from which that society will view her problem. Similarly, in the novel, the audience gets to know Lucy and her feelings from her perspective, through her actions and dialogs, which renders it a certain form of emotional intensity to the character. On the other hand, in Lucy poems, the audience never sees or hears Lucy in person. Whatever information the author chooses to share with the readers derives from the narrator’s perspective and the perception that this anonymous person conceives and reveals about her. Thus, the author wraps his female character in a shroud of mystery and alludes to her traits by way of using distinct and vivid imageries but ambiguous attributes to her existence such as every day she looked â€Å"Fresh as a rose in June† and the narrator l amenting, â€Å"O mercy!† on the event that she is dead (Wordsworth Poem I Lines 6, 27). From these allusions, the audience is not able to make out whether Lucy is a person who actually has lived and died, or whether she just symbolizes some aspect of nature. In contrast, Coetzee’s Lucy comes alive on the pages through the straightforward narration of the stark realities of her existence and the depiction of her vivid emotions as can be evidenced from her denial of her father’s offer to send her to Holland saying that â€Å"There is nothing you can suggest that I haven’t been through a hundred times† (Coetzee 157). This dialog illustrates the emotional trauma of the character and the conflict she undergoes, through her own narration of it.

Organizational Case Study Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Organizational Case Study - Assignment Example The transformation forces businesses to rethink their methods and offer new products or services in their stores. In the process, such businesses engage in downsizing. During the process of downsizing, Staples Inc reduced its outlet shops by 15%. This made the company realize reduced profits of 72% (Staples, 2013). The decrease in profits was due to charges of restructuring the company. Staples Inc is experiencing a considerable heat from the southern part where online retailing is flourishing. This forced the company to take more than 90% of its products to be sold online (Staples, 2013). Additionally, Staple Canada develops an innovation lab to test new services centered on small-business customers. The lab is piloting meeting rooms and rental office, a self-serve Banner Xpress machine used for printing, Starbucks coffee shop and technology-training center (Straus, 2013). The stores chosen for downsizing are more than 25,000 square feet though they could reach15,000 square feet. So me of the stores have leases which run out within a year. This gives Staple company time to close them at that time (Staples, 2013). Importance of Downsizing Downsizing helps in managing duplication of roles. It is easy to find more than two employees conducting a task that a single person could conduct. Downsizing assists in correcting such scenario (Staples, 2013). Downsizing is also good in clearing ghost workers who earn a salary without working. Secondly, the system allows an organization to recover from its financial crises. This is because the company can lessen operational costs by lessening proportion of employees. Downsizing also enables the managers to manage an organization properly because the organization is reduced in size (Staples, 2013). Additionally, the company can get rid of incompetent employees and hire employees who are willing to serve the company diligently (Straus, 2013). Human Resources Challenges Facing Staple Company Staple Company is not exactly sure of downsizing would achieve the needed purpose. This is because; the remaining employees would ask more payment due to overworking. Secondly, the employees who were sucked must be compensated. This means Staples Company would have to incur an extra cost thus increase its cost of operation. Downsizing is a source of poor morale, guilt and stress on retained employees. As a result, the employees are likely to reduce their productivity that may reduce the company’s output (Staples, 2013). The company experiences low level of productivity from its employee due insecurity of their jobs as a result of downsizing programme. Another challenge is lack of technological skills in their fields. Inadequacy and weakness due lack of basic education to cope with the changing technological and scientific development also contributes to the current problem. Another problem is lack of mechanism to create promotion opportunities amidst employees. This is due to a high number of employees that the organization hires. The company also loses some of its best employees to rival companies that offer best terms of employment and job security. The company is also unable to attract employees with technical talents. Most of employees shun the company due to its downsizing programme that requires it to reduce its employees. Furthermore, the company lacks good engineers or computer experts who can assist in distribution of its resources. To counter this problem, the company is going

Multilateralism and Small Developing States Essay -- The Political Eco

Multilateralism serves to be both a blessing and a curse, when placed amongst small island developing states in the global system. The statement without a shadow of a doubt stands true that multilateralism can simultaneously advance and undermine the interest of small island developing states in the global system. Small island developing states lack the power, wealth and influence to exert any political clout in the global political arena at the individual state level and as such, often times than none, their interest are overlooked and ignored. A we take a critical look at multilateralism, the very definition of the word according to (Keohane,1990;731) defined multilateralism as â€Å"the practice of coordinating national policies in groups of three or more states.† By this very definition, we can see the contradictions that lies within, when looking at this through a Caribbean lens. Multilateralism, where Caribbean states are involved in binding agreements, can be argued to be a contradiction on the basis of the contending international relations theories of Realism and Idealism. The first theoretical perspective to be undertaken will be the Realist perspective on states in the global political arena. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy states clearly that â€Å"Realism, also known as political realism, is a view of international politics that stresses its competitive and conflictual side. It is usually contrasted with idealism or liberalism, which tends to emphasize cooperation.(Baylis, Smith and Owens, 2011; 4) states that, â€Å" the main actors on the world stage are states, which are legally sovereign actors. Sovereignty means that there is no actor above the state that can compel it to act in specific ways,. Other acrors, such a... ... 61 (4): 853–876. †¢ Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Power and. Interdependence: World Politics in Transition (Boston: Little, Brown, 1977) †¢ Keohane, Robert O. â€Å"Multilateralism: An Agenda for Research.† International Journal, 45 (Autumn 1990). †¢ McGinnis, John O. â€Å"The Political Economy of Global Multilateralism.† Chicago Journal of International Law, Fall2000, 6. †¢ Strange, Susan. (1997). â€Å"Territory, State, Authority and Economy: a new realist ontology of global political economy.† In The New Realism. Edited by Robert, W. Cox (New York: The United Nations University Press, pp 3-19). †¢ Spangler, Brad. "Integrative or Interest-Based Bargaining." Beyond Intractability. Eds. Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess. Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Posted: June 2003 .

Mother To Son Essay

The author, Langston Husthes, vividly showed how the African-Americans struggled and managed to live. The efforts they made to change and how much they changed their appearances were very evident in the three poems, â€Å"I am too†, â€Å"Mother to Son†, and â€Å"Negro†. The writer started the poem using a conversational tone, which easily showed its viewers that he was talking to somebody. In his poem, â€Å"Mother To Son†, the author told the story of how the African-Americans struggled to survive the harsh realities of living in a society dominated by the white people. The text included: â€Å"Life for me aint been no crystal stair. Its had tacks in it, And splinters, And boards torn up, And places with no carpet on the floor — Bare. † This specific part of the poem showed how much the African-Americans suffered from living in a society dominated by white people. The author used a lot of metaphors in the poem to illustrate his points. The â€Å"crystal stair† mentioned in the poem, contained several meanings. The crystal may be considered to be attractive, but very fragile. The use of the crystal in the poem was somehow successful in connecting a creative story with that of reality-that the crystal stair may be used as a symbol for the way of living white people had. The poem was also told from a mother’s point of view. From the text, it can be perceived that the mother was a slave at the white house, serving white people. The reader is given contrasting images of how the African-Americans suffered, while the white and rich Americans ruled over society. Throughout the entire poem, the mother tried to show the readers the uneven treatment given to both races. Words, such as â€Å"and† were repeatedly used to emphasize the hardships endured during that time. The line, â€Å"And places with no carpet on the floor –Bare,† was also used to demonstrate how the white people unfairly treated the black people.

Can This Relationship Be Saved The Midwestern Groups Integration Journey Free Essay Example, 1250 words

The present research has identified that the MMG acts as a major supplier of customers to the hospital division. The relationship of this collaboration is however not quantified. Therefore the hospital branch refuses to acknowledge the effect of this MMG. The new management under Olsen aims to create an alliance with other hospital groups in the region. This alliance can be a negative factor for the Midwestern group if not managed effectively. This is because the clinics can be easily plucked away, as has been shown in the past. Once alliances have been formed it would become much easier for the clinics to simply move away from the Midwestern group and MMG. The availability of customer is not major issues for Midwestern in the current structure. However, if the structure is change i. e. MMG is divested or sold off then there would be a decreased flow of customers to other parts of the organization. The retail channel formulation is relevant to this discussion. The current structure of Midwestern groups forms a retail chain like system. Therefore even if the customer ends up buying the product from the Midwestern hospital, the entire chain is responsible for creating the brand that is Midwestern. We will write a custom essay sample on Can This Relationship Be Saved The Midwestern Groups Integration Journey or any topic specifically for you Only $17.96 $11.86/pageorder now Therefore it can be said that if the MMG is no longer present the market size for Midwestern would shrink. The actual competitors are the other clinics and hospitals in the region. The integrated network of Midwestern, however, gives it an advantage over competitors. However, if the chain is broken than new competitors would start eating into the Midwestern market. Therefore the company will have to understand that the key strength lies in the integration of its different units. This is the main reasons that previous managements have not liquidated MMG. The main weakness of Midwestern competitors is the lack of integration. The smaller units can not pose a threat until they make an integrated network. The smaller practices, however, can target different business segments. The clinics that have broken off from MMG can also be a serious concern for the business.