this post was submitted on 01 Nov 2023
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The History of Microsoft Encarta (www.abortretry.fail)
submitted 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) by Ninjazzon@infosec.pub to c/technology@lemmy.ml
13 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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[–] jlow 14 points 11 months 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

[–] Moonrise2473@feddit.it 13 points 11 months ago (1 children)

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

[–] everett@lemmy.ml 4 points 11 months ago (2 children)

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

[–] victron@programming.dev 4 points 11 months 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.

[–] PhreakyByNature@feddit.uk 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Probably Dragon Dictate?

[–] ApeNo1@lemm.ee 4 points 11 months ago

Having spent so much of my youth using the familiar cream and dark brown 1970’s World Book Encyclopaedias, with the ever growing collection of Year Books, this was amazing. I was blown away watching videos of things like the JFK moon speech. This for many like me I imagine meant the end of flipping through physical encyclopaedias.

[–] lemann@lemmy.one 3 points 11 months 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?

[–] Ninjazzon@infosec.pub 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Sorry, I put the link wrong.

[–] lemann@lemmy.one 1 points 11 months ago

Yayy fixed, thank you 😁

[–] jollyrogue@lemmy.ml 2 points 11 months ago

Those graphics. 🫨

Peak performance for their time.

[–] siigna@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 11 months ago

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

https://youtu.be/vpA-uiUNHSg