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82-482: The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition (1910–1911) is a 29-volume reference work, an edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica . It was developed during the encyclopaedia's transition from a British to an American publication. Some of its articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time. This edition of the encyclopaedia, containing 40,000 entries, has entered the public domain and
164-716: A cultural artifact : the British Empire was at its maximum, imperialism was largely unchallenged, much of the world was still ruled by monarchs, and the tumultuous world wars were still in the future. They are a resource for topics omitted from modern encyclopaedias, particularly for biography and the history of science and technology. As a literary text, the encyclopaedia has value as an example of early 20th-century prose. For example, it employs literary devices , such as pathetic fallacy (attribution of human-like traits to impersonal forces or inanimate objects), which are not as common in modern reference texts. In 1917, using
246-711: A "Britannica Checked" stamp, to distinguish it from the user-generated content. On 14 September 2010, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. announced a partnership with mobile phone development company Concentric Sky to launch a series of iPhone products aimed at the K–12 market. On 20 July 2011, Encyclopædia Britannica, Incorporated announced that Concentric Sky had ported the Britannica Kids product line to Intel's Intel Atom -based Netbooks and on 26 October 2011 that it had launched its encyclopaedia as an iPad app . In 2010, Britannica released Britannica ImageQuest,
328-457: A complete electronic edition of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica . The preceding links adopt the spellings used in the target. Encyclop%C3%A6dia Britannica The Encyclopædia Britannica ( Latin for 'British Encyclopaedia') is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia . It has been published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. since 1768, although the company has changed ownership seven times. The encyclopaedia
410-425: A database of images. In March 2012, it was announced that the company would cease printing the encyclopaedia set, and that it would focus on its online version. On 7 June 2018, Britannica released a Google Chrome extension , "Britannica Insights", which shows snippets of information from Britannica Online whenever the user performs a Google Search , in a box to the right of Google's results. Britannica Insights
492-532: A handful of female contributors, with 34 women contributing articles to the edition. These included Adelaide Anderson , Gertrude Bell , Margaret Bryant , Constance Jocelyn Ffoulkes , Harriette Lombard Hennessy , and Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick . The eleventh edition introduced a number of changes of the format of the Britannica . It was the first to be published complete, instead of the previous method of volumes being released as they were ready. The print type
574-584: A more thorough update of the work was required. The fourteenth edition, published in 1929, was considerably revised, with much text eliminated or abridged to make room for new topics. Nevertheless, the eleventh edition was the basis of every later version of the Encyclopædia Britannica until the completely new fifteenth edition was published in 1974, using modern information presentation. The eleventh edition's articles are still of value and interest to modern readers and scholars, especially as
656-594: A partnership with YouTube in which verified Britannica content appeared on the site as an antidote to user-generated video content that could be false or misleading. Krishnan, an educator at New York University 's Stern School of Business , believes in the "transformative power of education" and set steering the company toward solidifying its place among leaders in educational technology and supplemental curriculum. Krishnan aimed at providing more useful and relevant solutions to customer needs, extending and renewing Britannica's historical emphasis on "utility", which had been
738-473: A reliable description of the academic consensus of its time, many modern readers find fault with the Encyclopedia for several major errors, ethnocentric and racist remarks, and other issues: The eleventh edition of Encyclopædia Britannica has become a commonly quoted source, both because of the reputation of the Britannica and because it is now in the public domain and has been made available on
820-417: A reprint of the eleventh edition, formed the twelfth edition of the work. A similar thirteenth edition, consisting of three volumes plus a reprint of the twelfth edition, was published in 1926. The London editor was J.L. Garvin , as Chisholm had died. The twelfth and thirteenth editions were closely related to the eleventh edition and shared much of the same content. However, it became increasingly apparent that
902-627: A single article; however, 64 contributed to three articles, 23 contributed to four articles, 10 contributed to five articles, and 8 contributed to more than five articles. An exceptionally prolific contributor is Christine Sutton of the University of Oxford , who contributed 24 articles on particle physics . While Britannica 's authors have included writers such as Albert Einstein , Marie Curie , and Leon Trotsky , as well as notable independent encyclopaedists such as Isaac Asimov , some have been criticized for lack of expertise. In 1911,
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#1732766114725984-405: A study guide, as it puts subjects in their proper perspective and suggests a series of Britannica articles for the student wishing to learn a topic in depth. However, libraries have found that it is scarcely used for this purpose, and reviewers have recommended that it be dropped from the encyclopaedia. The Propædia contains color transparencies of human anatomy and several appendices listing
1066-580: A subject's context and to find more detailed articles. Over 70 years, the size of the Britannica has remained steady, with about 40 million words on half a million topics. Though published in the United States since 1901, the Britannica has for the most part maintained British English spelling . From 1985, the Britannica consisted of four parts: the Micropædia , the Macropædia ,
1148-480: A three-part structure: a 12-volume Micropædia of short articles (generally fewer than 750 words), a 17-volume Macropædia of long articles (two to 310 pages), and a single Propædia volume to give a hierarchical outline of knowledge. The Micropædia was meant for quick fact-checking and as a guide to the Macropædia ; readers are advised to study the Propædia outline to understand
1230-661: Is a website with more than 120,000 articles and is updated regularly. It has daily features, updates and links to news reports from The New York Times and the BBC . As of 2009 , roughly 60% of Encyclopædia Britannica's revenue came from online operations, of which around 15% came from subscriptions to the consumer version of the websites. As of 2006 , subscriptions were available on a yearly, monthly or weekly basis. Special subscription plans are offered to schools, colleges and libraries; such institutional subscribers constitute an important part of Britannica's business. Beginning in early 2007,
1312-462: Is for children aged three to six (issued 1974 to 1991). There have been, and are, several abridged Britannica encyclopaedias. The single-volume Britannica Concise Encyclopædia has 28,000 short articles condensing the larger 32-volume Britannica ; there are authorized translations in languages such as Chinese created by Encyclopedia of China Publishing House and Vietnamese . Compton's by Britannica , first published in 2007, incorporating
1394-458: Is given in each volume to these initials. Some articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time, such as Edmund Gosse , J. B. Bury , Algernon Charles Swinburne , John Muir , Peter Kropotkin , T. H. Huxley , James Hopwood Jeans and William Michael Rossetti . Among the then lesser-known contributors were some who would later become distinguished, such as Ernest Rutherford and Bertrand Russell . Many articles were carried over from
1476-461: Is maintained by about 100 full-time editors and more than 4,000 contributors. The 2010 version of the 15th edition, which spans 32 volumes and 32,640 pages, was the last printed edition. Since 2016, it has been published exclusively as an online encyclopaedia . Printed for 244 years, the Britannica was the longest-running in-print encyclopaedia in the English language. It
1558-437: Is on the subject of the United States, and it resulted from merging separate articles on the individual US states . A 2013 "Global Edition" of Britannica contained approximately 40,000 articles. Information can be found in the Britannica by following the cross-references in the Micropædia and Macropædia ; these are sparse, however, averaging one cross-reference per page. Readers are instead recommended to consult
1640-488: Is readily available on the Internet. Its use in modern scholarship and as a reliable source has been deemed problematic due to the outdated nature of some of its content. Modern scholars have deemed some articles as cultural artifacts of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Nevertheless, the 11th edition has retained considerable value as a time capsule of scientific and historical information, as well as scholarly attitudes of
1722-740: The Enciclopedia Italiana and the Espasa as one of the three greatest encyclopaedias. It was the last edition to be produced almost in its entirety in Britain, and its position in time as a summary of the world's knowledge just before the outbreak of World War I is particularly valuable". Sir Kenneth Clark , in Another Part of the Wood (1974), wrote of the eleventh edition, "One leaps from one subject to another, fascinated as much by
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#17327661147251804-481: The Propædia , and a two-volume index. The Britannica 's articles are contained in the Micro- and Macropædia , which encompass 12 and 17 volumes, respectively, each volume having roughly one thousand pages. The 2007 Macropædia has 699 in-depth articles, ranging in length from two pages to 310 pages, with references and named contributors. In contrast, the 2007 Micropædia has roughly 65,000 articles,
1886-429: The 9th edition , some with minimal updating. Some of the book-length articles were divided into smaller parts for easier reference, yet others were much abridged. The best-known authors generally contributed only a single article or part of an article. Most of the work was done by journalists, British Museum scholars and other scholars. The 1911 edition was the first edition of the encyclopaedia to include more than just
1968-414: The Britannica 's Board of Directors. In 2003, former management consultant Jorge Aguilar-Cauz was appointed President of Encyclopædia Britannica, Incorporated. Cauz is the senior executive and reports directly to the Britannica 's Board of Directors. Cauz has been pursuing alliances with other companies and extending the Britannica brand to new educational and reference products, continuing
2050-590: The Britannica has been revised on a regular schedule, with at least 10% of the articles considered for revision each year. According to one Britannica website, 46% of the articles in the 2007 edition were revised over the preceding three years; however, according to another Britannica website, only 35% of the articles were revised over the same period. The alphabetization of articles in the Micropædia and Macropædia follows strict rules. Diacritical marks and non-English letters are ignored, while numerical entries such as " 1812, War of " are alphabetized as if
2132-425: The Britannica included five Senior Editors and nine Associate Editors, supervised by Dale Hoiberg and four others. The editorial staff helped to write the articles of the Micropædia and some sections of the Macropædia . As of 2012, Britannica had an editorial board of advisors, which included a number of distinguished figures, primarily scholars from a variety of disciplines. Past and present members of
2214-479: The Britannica made articles freely available if they are hyperlinked from an external site. Non-subscribers are served pop-ups and advertising. On 20 February 2007, Encyclopædia Britannica, Incorporated announced that it was working with mobile phone search company AskMeNow to launch a mobile encyclopaedia. Users will be able to send a question via text message, and AskMeNow will search Britannica 's 28,000-article concise encyclopaedia to return an answer to
2296-493: The Britannica turned to focus more on its online edition. The Encyclopædia Britannica has been compared with other print encyclopaedias, both qualitatively and quantitatively. A well-known comparison is that of Kenneth Kister , who gave a qualitative and quantitative comparison of the 1993 Britannica with two comparable encyclopaedias, Collier's Encyclopedia and the Encyclopedia Americana . For
2378-783: The Ku Klux Klan as protecting the white race and restoring order to the American South after the American Civil War , citing the need to "control the negro", and "the frequent occurrence of the crime of rape by negro men upon white women". Similarly, the "Civilization" article argues for eugenics , stating that it is irrational to "propagate low orders of intelligence, to feed the ranks of paupers, defectives and criminals ... which to-day constitute so threatening an obstacle to racial progress". The eleventh edition has no biography of Marie Curie , despite her winning
2460-617: The Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903 and the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911, although she is mentioned briefly under the biography of her husband Pierre Curie . The Britannica employed a large female editorial staff that wrote hundreds of articles for which they were not given credit. The 1911 edition is no longer restricted by copyright , and it is therefore freely available in several more modern forms. While it may once have been
2542-688: The Royal Society of Edinburgh , and cultural anthropologist Michael Wesch . The Propædia and its Outline of Knowledge were produced by dozens of editorial advisors under the direction of Mortimer J. Adler . Roughly half of these advisors have since died, including some of the Outline's chief architects – Rene Dubos (d. 1982), Loren Eiseley (d. 1977), Harold D. Lasswell (d. 1978), Mark Van Doren (d. 1972), Peter Ritchie Calder (d. 1982) and Mortimer J. Adler (d. 2001). The Propædia also lists just under 4,000 advisors who were consulted for
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2624-497: The 11th edition and following its acquisition by an American firm, the Britannica shortened and simplified articles to broaden its appeal to the North American market. In 1933, the Britannica became the first encyclopaedia to adopt "continuous revision", in which the encyclopaedia is continually reprinted, with every article updated on a schedule. In the 21st century, the Britannica suffered first from competition with
2706-441: The 11th edition for having bourgeois and old-fashioned opinions on art, literature, and social sciences. A contemporary Cornell professor, Edward B. Titchener , wrote in 1912, "the new Britannica does not reproduce the psychological atmosphere of its day and generation... Despite the halo of authority, and despite the scrutiny of the staff, the great bulk of the secondary articles in general psychology ... are not adapted to
2788-483: The 20th century, successful competitors included Collier's Encyclopedia , the Encyclopedia Americana , and the World Book Encyclopedia . Nevertheless, from the 9th edition onwards, the Britannica was widely considered to have the greatest authority of any general English-language encyclopaedia, especially because of its broad coverage and eminent authors. The print version of the Britannica
2870-579: The Google Chrome browser that served up edited, fact-checked Britannica information with queries on search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing. Its purpose, the company said, was to "provide trusted, verified information" in conjunction with search results that were thought to be increasingly unreliable in the era of misinformation and "fake news." The product was quickly followed by Britannica School Insights, which provided similar content for subscribers to Britannica's online classroom solutions, and
2952-599: The Internet. It has been used as a source by many modern projects, including Misplaced Pages and the Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia . The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia is the eleventh edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica , renamed to address Britannica's trademark concerns. Project Gutenberg 's offerings are summarized below in the External links section and include text and graphics. As of 2018, Distributed Proofreaders are working on producing
3034-798: The Life and Works of the Bard (Wiley, 2006). The Britannica Ultimate Reference Suite 2012 DVD contains over 100,000 articles. This includes regular Britannica articles, as well as others drawn from the Britannica Student Encyclopædia , and the Britannica Elementary Encyclopædia. The package includes a range of supplementary content including maps, videos, sound clips, animations and web links. It also offers study tools and dictionary and thesaurus entries from Merriam-Webster . Britannica Online
3116-465: The President of Encyclopædia Britannica announced that after 244 years, the encyclopaedia would cease print production and all future editions would be entirely digital. Stielers Handatlas Stielers Handatlas (after Adolf Stieler , 1775–1836), formally titled Hand-Atlas über alle Theile der Erde und über das Weltgebäude ( Handy atlas of all parts of the world and of the universe ),
3198-427: The alphabetical index or the Propædia , which organizes the Britannica 's contents by topic. The core of the Propædia is its "Outline of Knowledge", which aims to provide a logical framework for all human knowledge. Accordingly, the Outline is consulted by the Britannica 's editors to decide which articles should be included in the Micro- and Macropædia . The Outline can also be used as
3280-518: The board have included: non-fiction author Nicholas Carr , religion scholar Wendy Doniger , political economist Benjamin M. Friedman , Council on Foreign Relations President Emeritus Leslie H. Gelb , computer scientist David Gelernter , Physics Nobel laureate Murray Gell-Mann , Carnegie Corporation of New York President Vartan Gregorian , philosopher Thomas Nagel , cognitive scientist Donald Norman , musicologist Don Michael Randel , Stewart Sutherland, Baron Sutherland of Houndwood , President of
3362-444: The company announced that the 2010 edition would be the last printed version. This was part of a move by the company to adapt to the times and focus on its future using digital distribution. The peak year for the printed encyclopaedia was 1990, when 120,000 sets were sold, but sales had dropped to 40,000 per annum by 1996. There were 12,000 sets of the 2010 edition printed, of which 8,000 had been sold by March 2012. By late April 2012,
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3444-420: The company would be accepting edits and additions to the online Britannica website from the public. The published edition of the encyclopaedia will not be affected by the changes. Individuals wishing to edit the Britannica website will have to register under their real name and address prior to editing or submitting their content. All edits submitted will be reviewed and checked and will have to be approved by
3526-411: The content of the encyclopaedia was distributed as follows: Hooper sold the rights to Sears, Roebuck and Company of Chicago in 1920, completing the Britannica ' s transition to becoming a substantially American publication. In 1922, an additional three volumes (also edited by Hugh Chisholm) where published, covering the events of the intervening years, including World War I . These, together with
3608-437: The digital multimedia encyclopaedia Microsoft Encarta , and later with the online peer-produced encyclopaedia Misplaced Pages . In March 2012, it announced it would no longer publish printed editions and would focus instead on the online version. Britannica has been assessed as being more politically centrist compared to Misplaced Pages, which is considered to have a more left-leaning orientation. The 15th edition (1974–2010) has
3690-403: The efforts made to make it more popular. American marketing methods also assisted sales. Some 14% of the contributors (214 of 1507) were from North America, and a New York office was established to coordinate their work. The initials of the encyclopaedia's contributors appear at the end of selected articles or at the end of a section in the case of longer articles, such as that on China, and a key
3772-520: The eleventh and fourteenth editions in their entirety, said he found the fourteenth edition to be a "big improvement" over the eleventh, stating that "most of the material had been completely rewritten". Robert Collison , in Encyclopaedias: Their History Throughout The Ages (1966), wrote of the eleventh edition that it "was probably the finest edition of the Britannica ever issued, and it ranks with
3854-417: The encyclopaedia's professional staff. Contributions from non-academic users will sit in a separate section from the expert-generated Britannica content, as will content submitted by non- Britannica scholars. Articles written by users, if vetted and approved, will also only be available in a special section of the website, separate from the professional articles. Official Britannica material would carry
3936-459: The encyclopaedias had an article on sexual harassment in 1994. In the accuracy category, the Britannica received one "D" and seven "A"s, Encyclopedia Americana received eight "A"s, and Collier's received one "D" and seven "A"s; thus, Britannica received an average score of 92% for accuracy to Americana 's 95% and Collier's 92%. In the timeliness category, Britannica averaged an 86% to Americana' s 90% and Collier's 85%. In 2013,
4018-553: The era immediately preceding World War I . The 1911 eleventh edition was assembled with the management of American publisher Horace Everett Hooper . Hugh Chisholm , who had edited the previous edition, was appointed editor-in-chief, with Walter Alison Phillips as his principal assistant editor. Originally, Hooper bought the rights to the 25-volume 9th edition and persuaded the British newspaper The Times to issue its reprint, with eleven additional volumes (35 volumes total) as
4100-607: The former Compton's Encyclopedia , is aimed at 10- to 17-year-olds and consists of 26 volumes and 11,000 pages. Since 1938, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. has published annually a Book of the Year covering the past year's events. A given edition of the Book of the Year is named in terms of the year of its publication, though the edition actually covers the events of the previous year. The company also publishes several specialized reference works, such as Shakespeare: The Essential Guide to
4182-427: The historian George L. Burr wrote: With a temerity almost appalling, [the Britannica contributor, Mr. Philips] ranges over nearly the whole field of European history, political, social, ecclesiastical... The grievance is that [this work] lacks authority. This, too—this reliance on editorial energy instead of on ripe special learning—may, alas, be also counted an "Americanizing": for certainly nothing has so cheapened
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#17327661147254264-637: The number had been written out ("Eighteen-twelve, War of"). Articles with identical names are ordered first by persons, then by places, then by things. Rulers with identical names are organized first alphabetically by country and then by chronology; thus, Charles III of France precedes Charles I of England , listed in Britannica as the ruler of Great Britain and Ireland. (That is, they are alphabetized as if their titles were "Charles, France, 3" and "Charles, Great Britain and Ireland, 1".) Similarly, places that share names are organized alphabetically by country, then by ever-smaller political divisions. In March 2012,
4346-514: The open PubMed Central library of the National Library of Medicine . The Internet tends to provide more current coverage than print media, due to the ease with which material on the Internet can be updated. In rapidly changing fields such as science, technology, politics, culture and modern history, the Britannica has struggled to stay up to date, a problem first analysed systematically by its former editor Walter Yust. Eventually,
4428-454: The play of mind and the idiosyncrasies of their authors as by the facts and dates. It must be the last encyclopaedia in the tradition of Diderot which assumes that information can be made memorable only when it is slightly coloured by prejudice. When T. S. Eliot wrote 'Soul curled up on the window seat reading the Encyclopædia Britannica ,' he was certainly thinking of the eleventh edition." (Clark refers to Eliot's 1929 poem " Animula ".) It
4510-486: The price and made the Stieler accessible to a broad public. 16 maps hereof were exclusively translated to English, transferred to Imperial units and became part the 11th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica (1910–1911). Hermann Haack (1872–1966) edited the tenth (centenary) edition (1920–25, 108 maps), with an index to 320,000 entries being the most comprehensive world atlas of modern times. English versions of
4592-412: The printing industry had already changed to lithography for some time, some maps in Stieler's Atlas were still reproduced by copper-plate printing on hand presses with hand colouring into the 1890s. The ninth edition (1901–05), edited by Habenicht, with one hundred maps, over double the number of the initial edition, was the first one printed on cylinder machines by means of lithography, which halved
4674-624: The pseudonym of S. S. Van Dine, the US art critic and author Willard Huntington Wright published Misinforming a Nation , a 200+ page criticism of inaccuracies and biases of the Encyclopædia Britannica eleventh edition. Wright claimed that Britannica was "characterized by misstatements, inexcusable omissions, rabid and patriotic prejudices, personal animosities, blatant errors of fact, scholastic ignorance, gross neglect of non-British culture, an astounding egotism, and an undisguised contempt for American progress". Amos Urban Shirk , known for having read
4756-451: The quantitative analysis, ten articles were selected at random— circumcision , Charles Drew , Galileo , Philip Glass , heart disease , IQ , panda bear , sexual harassment , Shroud of Turin and Uzbekistan —and letter grades of A–D or F were awarded in four categories: coverage, accuracy, clarity, and recency. In all four categories and for all three encyclopaedias, the four average grades fell between B− and B+ , chiefly because none of
4838-586: The query. Daily topical features sent directly to users' mobile phones were also planned. On 3 June 2008, an initiative to facilitate collaboration between online expert and amateur scholarly contributors for Britannica's online content (in the spirit of a wiki ), with editorial oversight from Britannica staff, was announced. Approved contributions would be credited, though contributing automatically grants Encyclopædia Britannica, Incorporated perpetual, irrevocable license to those contributions. On 22 January 2009, Britannica's president, Jorge Cauz , announced that
4920-450: The remaining copies of the 2010 edition had sold out at Britannica's online store. As of 2016 , a replica of Britannica's 1768 first edition is available via the online store. Britannica Junior was first published in 1934 as 12 volumes. It was expanded to 15 volumes in 1947, and renamed Britannica Junior Encyclopædia in 1963. It was taken off the market after the 1984 printing. A British Children's Britannica edited by John Armitage
5002-408: The requirements of the intelligent reader". In an April 2012 article, Nate Pederson of The Guardian said that the eleventh edition represented "a peak of colonial optimism before the slaughter of war" and that the edition "has acquired an almost mythic reputation among collectors". Critics have charged several editions with racism, sexism , and antisemitism . The eleventh edition characterises
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#17327661147255084-642: The scholarship of our American encyclopaedias. As of 2007 in the 15th edition of Britannica , Dale Hoiberg , a sinologist , was listed as Britannica 's Senior Vice President and editor-in-chief. Among his predecessors as editors-in-chief were Hugh Chisholm (1902–1924), James Louis Garvin (1926–1932), Franklin Henry Hooper (1932–1938), Walter Yust (1938–1960), Harry Ashmore (1960–1963), Warren E. Preece (1964–1968, 1969–1975), Sir William Haley (1968–1969), Philip W. Goetz (1979–1991), and Robert McHenry (1992–1997). As of 2007 Anita Wolff
5166-726: The staff members, advisors, and contributors to all three parts of the Britannica . Taken together, the Micropædia and Macropædia comprise roughly 40 million words and 24,000 images. The two-volume index has 2,350 pages, listing the 228,274 topics covered in the Britannica , together with 474,675 subentries under those topics. The Britannica generally prefers British spelling over American ; for example, it uses colour (not color ), centre (not center ), and encyclopaedia (not encyclopedia ). There are some exceptions to this rule, such as defense rather than defence . Common alternative spellings are provided with cross-references such as "Color: see Colour." Since 1936,
5248-569: The strategy pioneered by former CEO Elkan Harrison Powell in the mid-1930s. In the fall of 2017, Karthik Krishnan was appointed global chief executive officer of the Encyclopædia Britannica Group. Krishnan brought a varied perspective to the role based on several high-level positions in digital media, including RELX (formerly known as Reed Elsevier, and one of the constituents of the FTSE 100 Index) and Rodale, in which he
5330-482: The tenth edition, which was published in 1902. Hooper's association with The Times ceased in 1909, and he negotiated with the Cambridge University Press to publish the 29-volume eleventh edition. Though it is generally perceived as a quintessentially British work, the eleventh edition had substantial American influences, in not only the increased amount of American and Canadian content, but also
5412-467: The unsigned Micropædia articles. In January 1996, the Britannica was purchased from the Benton Foundation by billionaire Swiss financier Jacqui Safra , who serves as its current chair of the board. In 1997, Don Yannias, a long-time associate and investment advisor of Safra, became CEO of Encyclopædia Britannica, Incorporated. In 1999, a new company, Britannica.com Incorporated ,
5494-446: The vast majority (about 97%) of which contain fewer than 750 words, no references, and no named contributors. The Micropædia articles are intended for quick fact-checking and to help in finding more thorough information in the Macropædia . The Macropædia articles are meant as authoritative, well-written commentaries on their subjects, as well as storehouses of information not covered elsewhere. The longest article (310 pages)
5576-685: The watchword of its first edition in 1768. As the Britannica is a general encyclopaedia, it does not seek to compete with specialized encyclopaedias such as the Encyclopaedia of Mathematics or the Dictionary of the Middle Ages , which can devote much more space to their chosen topics. In its first years, the Britannica 's main competitor was the general encyclopaedia of Ephraim Chambers and, soon thereafter, Rees's Cyclopædia and Coleridge's Encyclopædia Metropolitana . In
5658-473: Was created to develop digital versions of the Britannica ; Yannias assumed the role of CEO in the new company, while his former position at the parent company remained vacant for two years. Yannias' tenure at Britannica.com Incorporated was marked by missteps, considerable lay-offs, and financial losses. In 2001, Yannias was replaced by Ilan Yeshua , who reunited the leadership of the two companies. Yannias later returned to investment management, but remains on
5740-500: Was also available as a Firefox extension but this was taken down due to a code review issue. The print version of the Britannica has 4,411 contributors, many eminent in their fields, such as Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman , astronomer Carl Sagan , and surgeon Michael DeBakey . Roughly a quarter of the contributors are deceased, some as long ago as 1947 ( Alfred North Whitehead ), while another quarter are retired or emeritus . Most (approximately 98%) contribute to only
5822-472: Was also the first edition of Britannica to include biographies of living people. Sixteen maps of the famous 9th edition of Stielers Handatlas were exclusively translated to English, converted to imperial units , printed in Gotha , Germany, by Justus Perthes and the maps became a part of this edition. Later editions only included Perthes' maps as low-quality reproductions. According to Coleman and Simmons,
5904-646: Was censored under pressure from the Roman Catholic Church after the 11th edition. Initially, the eleventh edition received criticism from members of the Roman Catholic Church, who accused it of misrepresenting and being biased against Catholics . The most "vociferous" American Catholic critics of the eleventh edition were editors of the Christian magazine America . Authorities ranging from Virginia Woolf to professors criticised
5986-499: Was first published between 1768 and 1771 in the Scottish capital of Edinburgh , in three volumes. The encyclopaedia grew in size; the second edition was 10 volumes, and by its fourth edition (1801–1810), it had expanded to 20 volumes. Its rising stature as a scholarly work helped recruit eminent contributors, and the 9th (1875–1889) and 11th editions (1911) are landmark encyclopaedias for scholarship and literary style. Starting with
6068-622: Was issued in London in 1960. Its contents were determined largely by the eleven-plus standardized tests given in Britain. Britannica introduced the Children's Britannica to the US market in 1988, aimed at ages seven to 14. In 1961, a 16-volume Young Children's Encyclopaedia was issued for children just learning to read. My First Britannica is aimed at children ages six to 12, and the Britannica Discovery Library
6150-455: Was kept in galley proofs and subject to continual updating until publication. It was the first edition of Britannica to be issued with a comprehensive index volume in which was added a categorical index, where like topics were listed. It was the first not to include long treatise-length articles. Even though the overall length of the work was about the same as that of its predecessor, the number of articles had increased from 17,000 to 40,000. It
6232-518: Was listed as the Deputy Editor and Theodore Pappas as Executive Editor. Prior Executive Editors include John V. Dodge (1950–1964) and Philip W. Goetz. Paul T. Armstrong remains the longest working employee of Encyclopædia Britannica. He began his career there in 1934, eventually earning the positions of treasurer, vice president, and chief financial officer in his 58 years with the company, before retiring in 1992. The 2007 editorial staff of
6314-420: Was not until the sixth edition (1871–75, 90 maps), edited by August Petermann (1822–78), Hermann Berghaus (1828–1890) and Carl Vogel (1828–1897), that the work reached the high scientific level and the unsurpassed relief Stieler's Atlas is famous for. A seventh edition was issued 1879-82; an eighth 1888-91 (both 95 maps) under the direction of Hermann Berghaus, Vogel and Hermann Habenicht (1844–1917). Although
6396-572: Was one of Jorge Luis Borges 's favourite works, and was a source of information and enjoyment for his entire working life. In 1912, mathematician L. C. Karpinski criticised the eleventh edition for inaccuracies in articles on the history of mathematics , none of which had been written by specialists. English writer and former priest Joseph McCabe claimed in Lies and Fallacies of the Encyclopædia Britannica (1947) that Britannica
6478-421: Was published as separate plates from 1817 to 1823. There were 47 maps, though the intention had been to publish 50. After Stieler's death Friedrich von Stülpnagel (1786–1865) edited the first (1834-1845) edition, and the second (1845–47) with 107 maps. Petermann contributed to the third (1854–62) edition containing 83 maps, the fourth (1864–67) and the fifth (1868–74), each with 84 maps. However, it
6560-400: Was responsible for "driving business and cultural transformation and accelerating growth". Taking the reins of the company as it was preparing to mark its 250th anniversary and define the next phase of its digital strategy for consumers and K–12 schools, Krishnan launched a series of new initiatives in his first year. First was Britannica Insights, a free, downloadable software extension to
6642-466: Was significantly more expensive than its competitors. Since the early 1990s, the Britannica has faced new challenges from digital information sources. The Internet, facilitated by the development of search engines , has grown into a common source of information for many people, and provides easy access to reliable original sources and expert opinions, thanks in part to initiatives such as Google Books , MIT 's release of its educational materials and
6724-453: Was the leading German world atlas of the last three decades of the 19th and the first half of the 20th century. Published by Justus Perthes of Gotha (established 1785 and still existing there) it went through ten editions from 1816 to 1945. As with many 19th century publications, an edition was issued in parts; for example, the eighth edition was issued in 32 monthly parts. The earliest edition, by Stieler and Christian Gottlieb Reichard ,
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