So, this is pretty interesting. According to Alexa.com, Wikipedia is now more popular than Britannica.
eb.com is ranked 16,884 http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=http://www.eb.c...
britannica.com is ranked 3,054 http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=http://www.brit...
wikipedia.org is ranked 3,012 http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=http://www.wiki...
For those with html <Img src="http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=379&h=216&r=6m&u=britannica.com/&u=wikipedia.org">
For those without - <A href="http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=379&h=216&r=6m&u=britannica.com/&u=wikipedia.org">
Quite a little horserace. 8-).
--- Jimmy Wales jwales@bomis.com wrote:
So, this is pretty interesting. According to Alexa.com, Wikipedia is now more popular than Britannica.
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Stevertigo wrote (just as it came to me):
For those with html <Img src="http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=379&h=216&r=6m&u=britannica.com/&u=wikipedia.org">
For those without - <A href="http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=379&h=216&r=6m&u=britannica.com/&u=wikipedia.org">
Quite a little horserace. 8-).
I'm not sure why <a href=...> is supposed to be more legible to me than <img src=...> -- I just copy and paste either to my browser. ^_^
-- Toby
ure why <a href=...> is supposed to be more
legible to me than <img src=...> -- I just copy and paste either to my browser. ^_^ -- Toby
Brainfart. Thats what that was.
-nuff said :} SV~~~
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I think this warrants a press release! Could someone that knows at least something about them start one at http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Press_release:_Wikipedia_surpass es_Britannica please?
-- Michael Becker
-----Original Message----- From: wikien-l-admin@wikipedia.org [mailto:wikien-l-admin@wikipedia.org] On Behalf Of Jimmy Wales Sent: Tuesday, July 08, 2003 3.18 To: wikien-l@wikipedia.org Subject: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia more popular than Britannica!
So, this is pretty interesting. According to Alexa.com, Wikipedia is now more popular than Britannica.
eb.com is ranked 16,884 http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=http://www.eb.c om/
britannica.com is ranked 3,054 http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=http://www.brit annica.com/
wikipedia.org is ranked 3,012 http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=http://www.wiki pedia.org/
_______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On 07/08/03 at 07:58 PM, Michael Becker wikipedia@jumpingjackweb.com said:
I think this warrants a press release! Could someone that knows at least something about them start one at http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Press_release:_Wikipedia_surpass es_Britannica please?
ok, I had a go. The quotes from Jimmy Wales are *proposed*; he should check them obviously. Also, can someone provide accurate new articles and edits per day stats? (Mine are rough guesses).
HTH
Toby-
Jimmy Wales wrote:
So, this is pretty interesting. According to Alexa.com, Wikipedia is now more popular than Britannica.
We should probably keep in mind that Britannica is also available in print. In fact, that's the brand's traditional medium.
Encarta has very much harmed Britannica's print sales. Britannica counted on their brand name and image, but even many of their customers did not see why they would have to pay thousands of dollars for a paper encyclopedia when they could get a decent encyclopedia, plus lots of multimedia stuff, maps etc. for 100 bucks or less, and the whole thing would fit neatly into their back pocket.
Swiss investor Jacob Safra bought Britannica in 1996 (it's still based in Chicago), and the sales staff for the paper version was fired shortly thereafter. Since then the focus has been almost exclusively on the Internet and CD-ROM version, which was massively reduced in price and is now dirt cheap. For some time they even had the full text online -- remember, those were the dot com days.
Things are looking pretty grim for Britannica. Their Java-based software is a piece of crap, and Encarta has much better marketing. They still have their original content bonus, but even in terms of content they have massive weaknesses in some areas (for example, compare their article on circumcision with ours). I think the Britannica brand will live on, but in terms of competition we should be more worried about Encarta (and vice versa).
Regards,
Erik
If only Wikimedia could buy out EB........cheap......Imagine!! Ec
Erik Moeller wrote:
Toby-
Jimmy Wales wrote:
So, this is pretty interesting. According to Alexa.com, Wikipedia is now more popular than Britannica.
We should probably keep in mind that Britannica is also available in print. In fact, that's the brand's traditional medium.
Encarta has very much harmed Britannica's print sales. Britannica counted on their brand name and image, but even many of their customers did not see why they would have to pay thousands of dollars for a paper encyclopedia when they could get a decent encyclopedia, plus lots of multimedia stuff, maps etc. for 100 bucks or less, and the whole thing would fit neatly into their back pocket.
Swiss investor Jacob Safra bought Britannica in 1996 (it's still based in Chicago), and the sales staff for the paper version was fired shortly thereafter. Since then the focus has been almost exclusively on the Internet and CD-ROM version, which was massively reduced in price and is now dirt cheap. For some time they even had the full text online -- remember, those were the dot com days.
Things are looking pretty grim for Britannica. Their Java-based software is a piece of crap, and Encarta has much better marketing. They still have their original content bonus, but even in terms of content they have massive weaknesses in some areas (for example, compare their article on circumcision with ours). I think the Britannica brand will live on, but in terms of competition we should be more worried about Encarta (and vice versa).
Regards,
Erik _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Eclecticology wrote:
Erik Moeller wrote:
Things are looking pretty grim for Britannica. Their Java-based software is a piece of crap, and Encarta has much better marketing. They still have their original content bonus, but even in terms of content they have massive weaknesses in some areas (for example, compare their article on circumcision with ours). I think the Britannica brand will live on, but in terms of competition we should be more worried about Encarta (and vice versa).
If only Wikimedia could buy out EB........cheap......Imagine!!
But as EB falls in price, it'll reach first the point where Encarta can buy it but we can't. If Encarta sees us at that time as a threat, then they'll be sure to snap EB up before we can. We can't let them sniff us out until we have to cash to buy EB.
How's /this/ for a slogan: "Sifterpaedia Britannica(R) -- the free encyclopadia that you can trust" ^_^ ^_^ ^_^
-- Toby
Toby Bartels wrote:
Eclecticology wrote:
Erik Moeller wrote:
Things are looking pretty grim for Britannica. Their Java-based software is a piece of crap, and Encarta has much better marketing. They still have their original content bonus, but even in terms of content they have massive weaknesses in some areas (for example, compare their article on circumcision with ours). I think the Britannica brand will live on, but in terms of competition we should be more worried about Encarta (and vice versa).
If only Wikimedia could buy out EB........cheap......Imagine!!
But as EB falls in price, it'll reach first the point where Encarta can buy it but we can't. If Encarta sees us at that time as a threat, then they'll be sure to snap EB up before we can. We can't let them sniff us out until we have to cash to buy EB.
How's /this/ for a slogan: "Sifterpaedia Britannica(R) -- the free encyclopadia that you can trust" ^_^ ^_^ ^_^
Hmmm, to continue the speculation. :-)
This kind of situation does not lend itself very well to waiting until we have the cash. Encarta has a bit of an advantage in that department. A purchase offer of $1.00 may be more appropriate if it's presented as an offer which Safra's estate can't refuse.
For interesting background reading see http://www.businessweek.com/1997/42/b3549124.htm and http://www.jewishsf.com/bk991210/obsafra.shtml
Our offer also needs to maintain Wikipedia's philosophical integrity.
"Be bold in updating Wikipedia!" ;-)
Ec.
Ray Saintonge wrote:
This kind of situation does not lend itself very well to waiting until we have the cash. Encarta has a bit of an advantage in that department. A purchase offer of $1.00 may be more appropriate if it's presented as an offer which Safra's estate can't refuse.
For interesting background reading see http://www.businessweek.com/1997/42/b3549124.htm and http://www.jewishsf.com/bk991210/obsafra.shtml
Our offer also needs to maintain Wikipedia's philosophical integrity.
It's a shame that Safra has died, because presumably his estate will have fiduciary responsibilities that would preclude any sort of OS gift to the world. Safra might have been persuadable, from the point of view of charity, but his heirs, it's hard to predict.
on 8/5/03 7:59 AM, Jimmy Wales at jwales@bomis.com wrote:
An aproposs quote from that article:
"...there are so many reasonable and free options [to obtain encyclopedic information] that are good enough...
Of course, we would not want to call Wikipedia, "good enough".
The phrase "good enough" is generally used in parenting talk to describe an upbringing which avoids disaster.
Fred
On Tue, 5 Aug 2003, Jimmy Wales wrote:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
This kind of situation does not lend itself very well to waiting until we have the cash. Encarta has a bit of an advantage in that department. A purchase offer of $1.00 may be more appropriate if it's presented as an offer which Safra's estate can't refuse.
For interesting background reading see http://www.businessweek.com/1997/42/b3549124.htm and http://www.jewishsf.com/bk991210/obsafra.shtml
Our offer also needs to maintain Wikipedia's philosophical integrity.
It's a shame that Safra has died, because presumably his estate will have fiduciary responsibilities that would preclude any sort of OS gift to the world. Safra might have been persuadable, from the point of view of charity, but his heirs, it's hard to predict.
Since I've only just heard of these people, I may be getting this wrong, but it seems from what I've been reading that there are two different Safras being discussed here. The chap who died in the fire was Edmond Jacob Safra (August 6, 1931 or 1932 - December 3, 1999), while the chap who bought the "Encyclopaedia Britannica" is his nephew Jacob Safra (born c. 1950), who as far as I can tell is still alive...
References:
The above two pages, and these ones: * http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=367708 * http://www.adamdavidson.com/tencyc.html
Who wants to volunteer to do some more research and write biographical articles for these people for the Wikipedia? :)
Oliver
+-------------------------------------------+ | Oliver Pereira | | Dept. of Electronics and Computer Science | | University of Southampton | | omp199@ecs.soton.ac.uk | +-------------------------------------------+
On Tue, 5 Aug 2003, Oliver Pereira wrote:
Since I've only just heard of these people, I may be getting this wrong, but it seems from what I've been reading that there are two different Safras being discussed here. The chap who died in the fire was Edmond Jacob Safra (August 6, 1931 or 1932 - December 3, 1999), while the chap who bought the "Encyclopaedia Britannica" is his nephew Jacob Safra (born c. 1950), who as far as I can tell is still alive...
Sorry, I meant "c. 1960". The following article, dated March 1, 1998, says that Jacob Safra is "supposed to be in his late 30s".
Oliver
+-------------------------------------------+ | Oliver Pereira | | Dept. of Electronics and Computer Science | | University of Southampton | | omp199@ecs.soton.ac.uk | +-------------------------------------------+
Oliver Pereira wrote:
Since I've only just heard of these people, I may be getting this wrong, but it seems from what I've been reading that there are two different Safras being discussed here. The chap who died in the fire was Edmond Jacob Safra (August 6, 1931 or 1932 - December 3, 1999), while the chap who bought the "Encyclopaedia Britannica" is his nephew Jacob Safra (born c. 1950), who as far as I can tell is still alive...
Ah, this warrants further investigation, then.
Perhaps Jacob could get excited about much cheaper philanthropy to generate a superior result. He could close the operation of Britannica, give the Wikimedia Foundation 1/10th of what he expects to lose, and authorize us to use the name.
I'll be the new Mortimer Adler, it'll be fun.
--Jimbo
Jimmy Wales wrote:
Oliver Pereira wrote:
Since I've only just heard of these people, I may be getting this wrong, but it seems from what I've been reading that there are two different Safras being discussed here. The chap who died in the fire was Edmond Jacob Safra (August 6, 1931 or 1932 - December 3, 1999), while the chap who bought the "Encyclopaedia Britannica" is his nephew Jacob Safra (born c. 1950), who as far as I can tell is still alive...
Ah, this warrants further investigation, then.
Perhaps Jacob could get excited about much cheaper philanthropy to generate a superior result. He could close the operation of Britannica, give the Wikimedia Foundation 1/10th of what he expects to lose, and authorize us to use the name.
I'll be the new Mortimer Adler, it'll be fun.
Admittedly, I didn't look too deeply into the possibility that there would be two Jacob Safras. As long as my idea remained in the realm of speculation it didn't matter much. There are two kinds of ideas that can succeed: little conservative ones where with a lot of hard work you might beat them out for a single, and the hairbrained ones full of chutzpah that you knock right out of the park. A takeover of EB would clearly fall in the latter.
Whichever Safra is involved it seems clear that his takeover of EB was more than just a money making venture. A great deal of prestige, idealism and philanthropy went into that equation. The key to our winning EB could lie in how we appeal in those terms to the Safra family.
Looking into this subject leads me into all sorts of interesting observations. In http://slate.msn.com/id/1003924/ there is some analysis of EB's failings, with suggestions that even the likes of Disney are salivating for EB's scraps. But there is another observation to be made: This is an msn site, and although it mentions how Encarta was given the encyclopedia market on a silver platter, nowhere in the article or in the frame is there a link to Encarta!
Our NPOV policy and our openness are a great competitive advantage, and maintaining principles through periods of rapid growth will be a test yet to come. I don't think that the big players in the encyclopedia publishing game have yet fully grasped the importance of the revolution in concepts of intellectual property. Many of them may be too concerned with protecting fat salaries. The information has always belonged to the people, and it's only the way that it is expressed that is copyrightable. Until recently the people could be kept from that information because they did not have the means to reproduce and store it easily. Before Gutenberg only the very rich and the churches had complete acess to knowledge, and that acess was closely guarded. The churches, by guarding access to knowledge could control what knowledge you would be permitted. I believe that the growth of electronic media allows us to go one step further.
Anyway, to get my idle speculation back on track. I can see the possibility, at least initially, of EB as a separate project functioning as a subsidiary of Wikimedia. It could be a profit making subsidiary, but it would be extremely difficult to be sure of this without knowing its full finacial picture, including copyright arrangements for its existing material. It is conceivable that its noteworthy contributors may have insisted on retaining copyright as a condition of being published in EB.
Asking the Safras for 1/10 of their losses is interesting, but I don't know if it would be necessary. They will of course be able to take a big tax loss, and making sure that what we get is free from any debt load would be a handy feature. An understanding that we would give a share of the profit to one of their favorite charities (of their choice) could be a convincing argument. We already have a Wikipedian who works for the Holocaust Museum.
It's fun to muse about these things. :-) Do we have anybody who has personal contact with the Safras?
Eclecticology
It might be of interest, that both the Britannica and Encarta websites still state that Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone despite the US congress passing a resolution in 2001 acknowleding that it was infact invented by Antonio Meucci http://www.popular-science.net/history/meucci_congress_resolution.html - whereas of course Wikipedia was corrected some time ago.
Mintguy
----- Original Message ----- From: "Erik Moeller" erik_moeller@gmx.de To: wikien-l@wikipedia.org Sent: Wednesday, July 09, 2003 7:49 AM Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia more popular than Britannica!
Toby-
Jimmy Wales wrote:
So, this is pretty interesting. According to Alexa.com, Wikipedia is now more popular than Britannica.
We should probably keep in mind that Britannica is also available in
print.
In fact, that's the brand's traditional medium.
Encarta has very much harmed Britannica's print sales.....