[Foundation-l] Why "Wikipedia" and not "the Wikipedia"?

[Anthony]

On Sat, Jun 27, 2009 at 2:36 PM, Anthony <wikimail at inbox.org> wrote:

> On Sat, Jun 27, 2009 at 11:29 AM, Andrew Gray <andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk>wrote:
>
>> (Perhaps Britannica gets it because "Encyclopedia" is a common word -
>> we'd feel silly with the sentence "I looked it up in Encyclopedia
>> Britannica", because "I looked it up in encyclopedia" would itself be
>> wrong)
>
>
> I don't have a problem with the sentence "I looked it up in Encyclopedia
> Britannica".  In fact, after consideration, I'd say adding in "the" would be
> technically incorrect.  Looking at britannica.com, EB consistently refers
> to itself without "the" in the beginning.
>

I'm sure there are quite a few other examples.  The only one that comes to
mind, though, is "Best Damn Sports Show Period", and that one is treated
inconsistently even by the official websites.