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 Encarta Premium 2008 onWindows Vista | |
| Developer(s) | Microsoft |
|---|---|
| Final release | 2009 / August 2008; 16 years ago (2008-08) |
| Operating system | Microsoft Windows |
| Available in | English, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch, Japanese |
| Type | Encyclopedia |
| License | Proprietarycommercial software |
| Website | Formerly encarta.msn.com at theWayback Machine (archived October 31, 2009) |
MicrosoftEncarta is a discontinueddigitalmultimediaencyclopedia and search engine published byMicrosoft from 1993 to 2009. Originally sold onCD-ROM orDVD, it was also available online via annual subscription, although later articles could also be viewed for free online with advertisements.[1] By 2008, the complete English version,Encarta Premium, consisted of more than 62,000 articles,[2] numerous photos and illustrations, music clips, videos, interactive content, timelines, maps, atlases and homework tools.[citation needed]
Microsoft published similar encyclopedias under theEncarta trademark in various languages, includingGerman,French,Spanish,Dutch,Italian,Portuguese andJapanese. Localized versions contained contents licensed from national sources and different amounts of content than the full English version. For example, the Dutch-language version had content from the DutchWinkler Prins encyclopedia.[3]
In March 2009, Microsoft announced it was discontinuing both theEncarta disc and online versions. TheMSNEncarta site was closed on October 31, 2009, in all countries except Japan, where it was closed on December 31, 2009.[4][5] Microsoft continued to operate theEncarta online dictionary until 2011.[6]
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In 1985, Microsoft attempted to establish a partnership withEncyclopædia Britannica to create a CD-ROM version of their publication. Since their management felt it would not fit in with their traditional print-based offerings,Britannica rejected Microsoft's offer.[7] By 1989, the software company struck a non-exclusive rights deal with the publishers of theFunk & Wagnalls Encyclopedia, and considered a rewrite of the material.[7][8] Following the successes ofCompton's Multimedia Encyclopedia (1989; published byBritannica[7]) andThe New Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia (1992),[9] Microsoft initiated their multimedia-encyclopedia project under the internal codename "Gandalf".[10][11][12][13]
In 1993, "Gandalf" was officially launched asEncarta; the name was created for Microsoft by an advertising agency.[14]Encarta cost $395 upon release,[15] although it soon dropped to $99, and was oftenbundled into the price of a new computer purchase.[16][17][18] The text ofFunk & Wagnalls served as the basis of its first edition;[8] Funk & Wagnalls continued to publish revised editions for several years independently ofEncarta, but ceased printing in the late 1990s.[citation needed]
Later that decade, Microsoft added content fromCollier's Encyclopedia andNew Merit Scholar's Encyclopedia fromMacmillan intoEncarta after purchasing them. Thus the final MicrosoftEncarta can be considered the successor of theFunk and Wagnalls,Collier, andNew Merit Scholar encyclopedias. None of these formerly successful encyclopedias remained in print for long after being merged intoEncarta.[citation needed]
Microsoft introduced several regional versions ofEncarta localized for international markets. For example, theBrazilian Portuguese version was introduced in 1999 and suspended in 2002.[19] The Spanish version was somewhat smaller than the English one, at 42,000 articles.[citation needed]
In 2000, the fullEncarta content became available on theWorld Wide Web to subscribers, with a subset available for free to anyone.[16] In 2006, Websters Multimedia, aBellevue, Washington subsidiary of London-based Websters International Publishers, took over maintenance ofEncarta from Microsoft.[20] The last version wasEncarta Premium 2009, released in August 2008.[2]
Microsoft announced in April 2009 that it would cease to sellMicrosoft Student and all editions ofEncarta Premium software products worldwide by June 2009, citing changes in the way people seek information, and in the traditional encyclopedia and reference material market, as the key reasons behind the termination.[4] Updates forEncarta were offered until October 2009.[4] Additionally, MSNEncarta web sites were discontinued around October 31, 2009, with the exception ofEncarta Japan which was discontinued on December 31, 2009. Existing MSNEncarta Premium (part ofMSN Premium) subscribers were refunded.[4]
The demise ofEncarta was widely attributed to competition from the free and user-generatedWikipedia,[21][22][23] which grew to be larger thanEncarta from its early beginnings in 2001[24] due to the popularization by web search services likeGoogle.[16]
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Encarta's standard edition[25] included approximately 50,000 articles, with additional images, videos and sounds. The premium editions contained over 62,000 articles and othermultimedia content, such as 25,000 pictures and illustrations, over 300 videos and animations, and an interactive atlas with 1.8 million locations. Its articles were integrated with multimedia content and could include links to websites selected by its editors.Encarta's articles in general were less lengthy and more summarized than the printed version ofEncyclopædia Britannica or the online Wikipedia. Like most multimedia encyclopedias,Encarta's articles tended to provide an overview of the subject rather than an exhaustive coverage and can only be viewed one at a time.[citation needed]
Asidebar could display alternative views, essays, journals or original materials relevant to the topic. For example, when reading about computers, it featuredannals since 1967 of the computer industry.Encarta also supportedclosed captioning for the hearing impaired. A separate program, calledEncarta Research Organizer was included in early versions for gathering and organizing information and constructing a Word document-based report. Later versions includedEncarta Researcher, a browser plugin to organize information fromEncarta articles and web pages into research projects. Content copied fromEncarta was appended with acopyright boilerplate message after the selection. The user interface allowed for viewing content with only images, videos, sounds, animations, 360-degree views, virtual tours, charts and tables or only interactives.[citation needed]
Encarta was originally available for sale on 1–5CD-ROMs or a DVD.[26][27] Some new PCs were shipped with anOEM edition of Encarta.[28]
Encarta 2000 and later had "Map Treks", which were tours of geographic features and concepts. Microsoft also had for a brief period a separate product known asEncarta Africana which was an encyclopedia of black history and culture. Starting with the 2001 version, it was integrated into the main Encarta Reference Suite.[29]Encarta 2002 and onward featured3D Virtual Tours of ancient structures, for example theAcropolis; 2D panoramic images of world wonders or major cities; and a virtual flight feature which allowed users to fly a virtual airplane over a coarsely generated artificiallandscape area. Version2002 also introduced the ability to install the entire encyclopedia locally to the hard disk drive to prevent frequent swapping of discs, and it updated far more often than its predecessors, with a rate of nearly 3–4 updates per week compared to the monthly updates that were used in prior versions of Encarta.[30]
Encarta 2003 incorporated literature guides and book summaries, foreign language translation dictionaries, aHomework Center andChart Maker.Encarta'sVisual Browser, available since the 2004 version, presented a user with a list of related topics making them more discoverable. A collection of 32Discovery Channel videos were also later added.Encarta 2005 introduced another program calledEncarta Kids aimed at children to make learning fun.[citation needed]
Encarta also included atrivia game called "MindMaze"[31] (accessible through Ctrl+Z)[32] in which the player explores a castle by answering questions whose answers can be found in the encyclopedia's articles.[33] There was also a "Geography Quiz" and several other games and quizzes, some quizzes also inEncarta Kids.[citation needed]
Until 2005,Encarta came in three primary software editions: Standard, Deluxe, and Reference Library (called Reference Suite until Encarta 2002) (price and features in that order). Beginning withEncarta 2006, however, whenWebsters Multimedia took over its maintenance,Encarta became a feature of Microsoft Student. Although it was possible to purchase only theEncarta encyclopedia separately, Microsoft Student bundles togetherEncarta Premium withMicrosoft Math (agraphing-calculator program) and Learning Essentials, an add-in which provides templates forMicrosoft Office. In addition, the Deluxe and Reference Library editions were discontinued: absorbed into a new, more comprehensive Premium package.Encarta's user interface was shared with Microsoft Student, and was streamlined to reduce clutter with only a Search box which returned relevant results. However, it became no longer possible to simply browse all the encyclopedia articles alphabetically.[citation needed]
The dynamic maps were generated with the same engine that poweredMicrosoft MapPoint software. The map was avirtual globe that one could freely rotate and magnify to any location down to major streets for big cities. The globe had multiple surfaces displaying political boundaries, physical landmarks, historical maps and statistical information. One could selectively display statistical values on the globe surface or in a tabular form, different sized cities, various geological or human-made features andreference lines in a map.[citation needed]
The maps containedhyperlinks to related articles ("Map Trek") and also supported a "Dynamic Sensor" that provides thelatitude,longitude,place name, population andlocal time for any point on the globe.Encarta also generated a visible-light moon atlas with names of majorcraters and hyperlinks. However, it did not include aplanetarium, but instead had a small interactiveconstellation-only map.[citation needed]
In addition to database generated maps, many other illustrative maps inEncarta ("Historical Maps") were drawn by artists. Some more advanced maps wereinteractive: for example, the large African map for Africana could display information such as political boundaries or the distribution of Africanflora.[citation needed]
Robert McHenry, while Editor-in-Chief of theEncyclopædia Britannica, criticizedEncarta for differences in factual content between national versions ofEncarta, accusing Microsoft of "pandering to local prejudices" instead of presenting subjects objectively.[34] An article written byBill Gates addressed the nature of writing encyclopedias for different regions.[35]
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Before the emergence of theWorld Wide Web for information browsing, Microsoft recognized the importance of having an engine that supported amultimediamarkup language, full text search, and extensibility using software objects. Thehypertext display,hyperlinking and search software was created by a team ofCD-ROM Division developers in the late 1980s who designed it as a generalized engine for uses as diverse asinteractive help,document management systems and as ambitious as a multimedia encyclopedia.[citation needed]
Encarta was able to use various Microsoft technologies because it was extensible withsoftware components for displaying unique types of multimedia information. For example, a snap in map engine is adapted from itsMapPoint software. The hypertext and search engine used byEncarta also poweredMicrosoft Bookshelf.[citation needed]
Encarta used database technologies to generate much of its multimedia content. For example,Encarta generated each zoomable map from a globalgeographic information system database on demand.[citation needed]
When a user used thecopy and paste function of Microsoft Windows onEncarta on more than five words,Encarta automatically appended acopyrightboilerplate message after the paste.[citation needed]
Early in 2005, Encarta's editor-in-chief at the time, Gary Alt, announced that the onlineEncarta started to allow users to suggest changes to existing articles.[36]
Encarta's content was accessible using a conversational interface onWindows Live Messenger via the MSNBot "Encarta Instant Answers".[37] The bot could answer many encyclopedia related questions directly in the IM window. It used short sentences from theEncarta website, and sometimes displays full articles in theInternet Explorer-based browser on the right. It also could complete simple mathematical and advanced algebra problems. This service was also available in German,[38] Spanish,[39] French[40] and Japanese.[41]
Each summer Microsoft published a new version ofEncarta. However, despite the inclusion of news-related and some supplementary articles,Encarta's contents had not been changed substantially in its later years. Besides the yearly update, the installed offline copy could be updated over the Internet for a certain period for free depending on the edition. Some articles (usually about 2,000) were updated to reflect important changes or events. When the update period expired, an advertisement prompting to upgrade to the new version was displayed to the user occasionally.[citation needed]
The editors ofPC Gamer US nominatedMicrosoft Encarta '95 for their 1994 "Best Educational Product" award, although it lost to the CD-ROM adaptation ofThe Way Things Work.[42]
Encarta is referenced in the title of the podcastEncarta & Chill in which the hosts discussthe 90s including memories ofEncarta.[43]Microsoft's recent Civilization Competitor Ara: History Untold calls its in-game encyclopedia Encarta
Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia now comes in two versions: the award-winning Encarta 97 Encyclopedia on a single compact disc, and the new two-CD Encarta 97 Encyclopedia, Deluxe Edition.
The Encarta Reference Library 2003 five-disc CD-ROM and single-disk DVD have an estimated retail price** of $74.95 (U.S.) before a $10 (U.S.) mail-in rebate.
For pure reference, Packard Bell is providing 'Microsoft(R) Encarta(TM) '95,'
MSN software and services | |
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| Rebranded | |
| Divested by Microsoft | |
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