It's always sad to see the death, or retirement of a legend. I can remember when Dean Smith retired, and the hearts of the UNC fanbase died a little. Now another legend looks to be retiring...

Microsoft Encarta.

Ok, so there's a difference between Dean Smith, and Encarta but they're both gone retired, that is certain. It was announced yesterday via NYT that Microsoft decided to scrap the encyclopedia. With Wikipedia controlling 97% of the visits to online encyclopedias, and Encarta only obtaining a little over 1%...it wasn't much of a shocker to see it happen.

It's obvious to see why Wikipedia put Microsoft out of commision. As fast as entries can be created, edited, or deleted there was no way Encarta could keep up. Even if the information was more reliable than what Wikipedia provides.

The exiting of Encarta is important for two reasons. First, is for personal/nostalgic reasons. I remember first booting up Encarta and I was mesmerized by the free flowing information. It's easy to impress an 8 year old though. Not only could you read about dinosaurs, there were videos, sound bytes, and games. The information became interactive.

You probably don't want to hear too much about my personal memories of Encarta, so let's discuss the second reason that its retirement is important. Information integrity. To give Wikipedia credit, I'd say that 'most' of what is posted on there is accurate. The community following Wikipedia, and the people that actually work for it are deep in its involvement. Still though, it's not academically accurate. It's easy to get caught up in the current Web 2.0 world, where information flies around at megabits/sec. Perhaps though, with Encarta's departure we can take time to remember that integrity, and quality is just as important as speed.

So, as we move on a bit wiser, and hopefully better off we say...

R.I.P Encarta..I mean goodbye

| JohnnyV |