A printed encyclopedia has unparalleled qualities because it is always at hand, quick, flexible and efficient. The computer is hopelessly old-fashioned in this context, writes Leif Osvold.

Journalist Bjørgulv Braanen claims in an article in Dagens Næringsliv on February 10th about Store Norske Leksikon that “it is obvious to everyone that the online revolution will lead to a large part of lexical knowledge acquisition taking place online.” This prediction is incorrect and therefore requires comment.

At home, we use this encyclopedia almost daily, for small and large lookups about things we are curious about. It only takes a few seconds to go to the bookshelf and find what we are looking for. This is precisely the great advantage of manual lookup in a physical object. Therefore, when I read Braanen's and Kunnskapsforlaget's visions of excluding the paper edition of the encyclopedia in the future and focusing mainly on an online edition, I don't think they know their people – or: They don't use encyclopedias themselves.

It is rather naive to think that a physical encyclopedia will eventually become redundant, and that all knowledge seeking will be replaced by searching and looking up information on the Internet. I am sure that those who believe this have never tried to find factual knowledge about a particular subject online. Try it, and measure how long it takes, compared to looking up information in an encyclopedia.

Then you quickly realize that searching the web for specific facts takes a hopelessly long time – if you are lucky enough to find what you are looking for at all – and it gets worse with each passing day as more information is put out there. Search engines only manage to archive a small fraction of this. Moreover, almost everything there is in English or another foreign language, and that only increases the alienation and weakens the usefulness.

The knowledge seeker with the online edition of the encyclopedia at home will have to go into another room, turn on the PC, insert the CD-ROM, wait for connection and then search for the information he is looking for. Such a method of knowledge acquisition will quickly prove to be useless for practical purposes, and will therefore be abandoned in thousands of homes. It takes far too long, it is alienating and frustrating, and will therefore be unthinkable for those who are used to using encyclopedias, even if they are otherwise familiar with using a PC and the Internet. The result for those at home who are tempted to buy the online edition of the encyclopedia will inevitably be that they will stop using it, and instead seek knowledge in the old paper editions of the encyclopedia that they have hopefully not thrown away. The unsurpassed feature of a paper edition is that it is at hand - literally - at all times, quickly, flexibly and efficiently, right from the sofa corner. PCs are hopelessly "old-fashioned" in that respect! Personally, I have no interest in an online edition of the encyclopedia, and I doubt if anyone else does either.

There is reason to be concerned about a future that is governed by the internet-savvy, and where common sense is neglected because "development demands it". Such a development in the field of encyclopedias is definitely a step backwards for users and knowledge seekers, but still we are involuntarily forced to adopt such a cumbersome method.

It will be the same as with digital TV: We don't need it, but will eventually be forced to buy it. I suspect Braanen and others who write so beautifully about the internet, that they only use it at work and not at home, and therefore consider the use of the internet from this narrow perspective.

The reason why the paper edition is no longer selling is probably as simple as the market being saturated, as most Norwegian homes already have an encyclopedia. This brings me to a related topic. I own the first edition of the Store Norske Leksikon from 1980. Since then, several updated editions of this encyclopedia have been published. I sincerely want to buy the latest edition, but I hesitate for a specific reason: What should I do with the 12 volumes I already have? I do not want - for space and other reasons - to keep the volumes I have, after buying a new edition. I definitely do not want to throw them away, as this is a waste of resources of the worst kind. The only sensible solution is therefore for Kunnskapsforlaget to take back previous editions when buying a new one. The publisher can then either recycle the stock or give the volumes away to institutions, schools and poor people. The 1980 edition can be used for several more decades! If Kunnskapsforlaget announced that it received all volumes from previous editions of Store Norske, I am sure that many would be tempted to buy the new edition.

A good piece of advice to all encyclopedia owners is to hold on to their paper edition regardless; it will become more and more appreciated as an unrivaled practical user tool as the online community is forced upon us.

Leif Osvold is an actuary and cand.philol.

CAPTION: Unparalleled. The writer believes paper encyclopedias are far better than PCs and the internet and encourages people to hold onto their old encyclopedias. Photo: ELIN HØYLAND

---

The original article was published in Dagens Næringsliv 1998.
Source image: osvold_papir_er_best.jpg
The Norwegian text has been automatically translated to English. Please send an email if you notice any factual errors compared to the Norwegian version.