--- Mathias Schindler <neubau(a)presroi.de> wrote:
March 23, 2005 07:00 AM US Eastern Timezone
New Britannica Keeps Pace with Change; Revised Encyclopedia Boosts
Coverage of People, Science & Changing World
CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 23, 2005--New and revised articles
spanning science and technology, literature and the Middle East are at
the center of the just-published Encyclopaedia Britannica for 2005.
Among the new articles included in the 32-volume work are a substantial
number in science and medicine, such as SARS, monkeypox, nanotechnology
and computer crime.
There is even an article on earth-impact hazard, the science of
predicting the probability of astronomical bodies hitting the planet.
LOL - I wrote the first Wikipedia version more than two years ago. It is now a
pretty darn good article.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_event
Several notable people receive their own entries for
the first time,
including U.S. Senator John Kerry, novelist and Nobel laureate J.M.
Coetzee, cellist Yo-Yo Ma and philosopher John Rawls. Socrates is the
subject of a lengthy new treatment that reflects the latest scholarship
on the Greek philosopher.
John Kerry! Wow - these people are really with it, aren't they. And Yo-Yo Ma
has been a very important person much longer than before the last EB update.
According to editor Dale Hoiberg, the revisions are
part of an effort to
keep the Britannica on the cutting edge of knowledge and world
developments at a time when the demand for reliable information is
greater than ever.
And they will be up to date for how long? Two weeks, maybe.
I did take pity on them by buying Britannica Concise for my Palm Pilot. They
really meant it when they called it concise though - all entries are as large
or smaller than our lead sections.
-- mav
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