The Internet is advancing, and it is also bringing down one of the last bulwarks of the printed press: the historical one Encyclopædia Britannica, first published 244 years ago in Scotland, will no longer exist in its traditional paper version.
So goodbye to the 32 volumes weighing almost 60 kilos, and space only for the online edition. “Despite a long history with print media, I would like to emphasize that no single medium, neither the books nor the bits, is at the heart of our mission,” he wrote. the managing director of Britannica, Jorge Cauz, on the official blog, also recalling that the only real mission is to "be reliable, up-to-date and capable of attracting the interest of readers".
So, no pet. On the contrary, necessary revolution, given the growing (although incomparable from a qualitative point of view) competition from Wikipedia, which, being available on the internet and free of charge, has conquered millions of users in recent years.
However, the new online service of the Encyclopaedia Britannica is not free: it costs 70 dollars a year (about 53 euros) and apps are already available whose cost varies from 2 to 5 dollars a month.
In fact, however, the revolution has already taken place: by now 85% of the historic encyclopaedia's annual collections come from the web, only 15% from paper publications. And last year 450 million people have visited the pages of Britannica.com.
