Wikipedia on Bookshelves. Would you buy it?
by Robert Dobes | May 8th, 2008
Apparently, Bertelsmann a major German publisher announced plans to sell a printed single volume version of the most popular articles from Wikipedia.
There’s a huge debate about the copyrights and whether the writes who participated in writing for wikipedia should be paid for their work. I am not a lawyer nor in the position to judge so I don’t even think of trying to say who’s right and who’s wrong. I rather have a question for you.
Would You Buy Wikipedia In Print?
I can speak only for myself but I believe there are many others thinking the same thing. Why would I pay for something that is easily available for free? Some may suggest the book will only include a selection of the best articles making it more interesting but I say, so what? I search wikipedia only for the articles I am really interested in not for the most popular once. Another thing is try to search the book for articles and try to search wikipedia online. It’s a no-brainer.
Bertelsmann announced the price of the book is expected to be 19.95EUR (about $32 U.S.) and to me that seems to be a hefty price for something you can get for free.
That’s just my 2 cents to this whole buzz.
