Posted on: Tuesday, March 9, 2004

Computer researching leaves encyclopedias to collect dust

By May Wong
Associated Press

SAN JOSE, Calif. — These are lonely days for encyclopedias.

At libraries, the volumes sit ignored for days on end as information-seeking patrons tap busily away at nearby computers.

Even in homes, that set of hard-bound books that once represented the crown tool of a good education gets the cold shoulder.

In the age of the Internet, encyclopedias are gathering dust, and most families with young children don't even consider buying the space-hogging, expensive printed sets anymore. Even digital versions struggle for attention.

Michael Gray's home computer came pre-loaded with Microsoft Corp.'s reference software, Encarta, but the seventh-grader from Milpitas, Calif., has never used it. He prefers doing research online, where information from a vast array of sources comes quickly, and for the most part, for free.

Like many students, his first Internet stop is Google.

"I find information really fast," Gray says, smiling proudly. "Within five to 10 minutes, I find a good (Web) site to work from."

Sometimes teachers — in a nod to the past and to stress traditional encyclopedias' usefulness — require students to use them as a source for reports. But with children now often knowing their way around a computer before they know how to read, it's like forcing students to use slide rules when they know calculators can do the job faster.

The thick volumes were long the status symbol of upper-class educated households, but the 1990s brought recession, saddling encyclopedia makers with defaulted loans. At the same time, computers were penetrating libraries and homes. Families with school-aged children weren't thinking about whether to spring for an encyclopedia set, but rather for a computer.

Then the World Wide Web exploded, making reference works on CD-ROMs seem antiquated.

The shrunken reference powers that survived the shakeout — namely Britannica, World Book, and Grolier, the maker of Encyclopedia Americana now owned by Scholastic Library Publishing — have now retooled to focus more on online products.

Voluminous sets are still printed, but mostly only for institutions. It's no surprise that the fastest-growing profits are in the online segment.

"Kids can hear and see Martin Luther King deliver his 'I Have a Dream' speech, and there's nothing in a book that can do that," said Cynthia Richey, president of the Association for Library Service to Children.