I feel bad that wikipedia (I contribute and donated to it long ago), has forever been a text and photo based encyclopedia based on web.
I do not think MS Encarta's budget was more than $50 million, while it obviously had no more than 1% of articles. But the content they had was top notch. It was a very good multimedia encyclopedia.
Wikipedia's budget is about $170 million (based on quick search). I don't think their software has any major updates, all the contributors work as volunteers. But they have 700 employees! And needlessly spend money on conventions.
If someone needs to create content for wikipedia, they need to create something like Encarta that can be fun to use for kids, and available from school libraries. I have fond memories of teachers playing encarta videos when explaining topics like resonance and why sodium is so reactive.
I do not think MS Encarta's budget was more than $50 million, while it obviously had no more than 1% of articles. But the content they had was top notch. It was a very good multimedia encyclopedia.
Wikipedia's budget is about $170 million (based on quick search). I don't think their software has any major updates, all the contributors work as volunteers. But they have 700 employees! And needlessly spend money on conventions.
If someone needs to create content for wikipedia, they need to create something like Encarta that can be fun to use for kids, and available from school libraries. I have fond memories of teachers playing encarta videos when explaining topics like resonance and why sodium is so reactive.