this post was submitted on 01 Nov 2023
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The History of Microsoft Encarta (www.abortretry.fail)
submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
21 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

In 1985, shortly after the release of Windows 1.0, Bill Gates set Min Lee on a mission to find a partner for a digital encyclopedia product that would serve as a reference companion to Microsoft’s productivity applications. Lee then approached Britannica, the undisputed leader in the encyclopedia market, who’d recently released a new version of the fifteenth edition of their encyclopedia. Microsoft proposed a partnership to produce a multimedia CD-ROM version of the Encyclopædia Britannica. In exchange for non-exclusive rights to Britannica’s text, Microsoft would pay Britannica a royalty on each copy of the CD-ROM product sold. Britannica immediately declined Lee’s proposal.

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Unfortunately, Wikipedia continued to grow, and Encarta sales declined.

Not seeing the unfortunate angle to this…

[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 years ago

I can see the writer's point with regard to Encarta being a much more interactive experience that you don't get with the likes of Wikipedia, but you're right, it's not that unfortunate that knowledge is being shared by Wikipedia for free

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Now I remember . I can't believe that I once asked for Microsoft Encarta for a birthday

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I leaned more from Encarta and Age of Empires than i did from anything else

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Wololo!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

Why am I feeling blue all of a sudden

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I've got a dorkier story: I asked for speech dictation software.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

Jfc I had forgotten those were the shit back then, with those dorky long microphones, plugged to a PC. Thank you for remind me how old I am.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Probably Dragon Dictate?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

I remember when that was recommended to be used with a 2nd drive as the install root ('cos the primary IDE didn't have the headroom for all the I/O - man, we've come a long way!)

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 years ago

Aww, so nostalgic, that was one of the first things we did on a PC as children. Listening to many nations anthems in terible midi quality ^__^

There seem to be quite a few up on archive.org:

https://archive.org/search?query=Encarta

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago

Encarta was amazing as a child. Came with videos & stuff on the entries. I learned so much.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Why the abrupt ending? Where's the rest 😭 did Britannica launch their own competing product? How did they react to Encarta's success? Where are both products today?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Sorry, I put the link wrong.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Thanks, that was a great read!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Yayy fixed, thank you 😁

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

The clip Encarta included from this song will forever be burned into my brain.

https://youtu.be/vpA-uiUNHSg

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

Here is an alternative Piped link(s):

https://piped.video/vpA-uiUNHSg

Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Those graphics. 🫨

Peak performance for their time.