1913 advertisement for the 11th edition, with the slogan When in doubt - look it up in the Encyclopædia Britannica The Encyclopædia Britannica (properly spelt with æ, the ae-ligature) is the oldest English-language general encyclopedia. ...
Britannica Inc., feeling that they had control of the market and showing strong profits (sales of the complete Britannica were priced between $1,500 and $2,200), turned Microsoft down.
Britannica had, for example, published the second multimedia encyclopedia titled Compton's MultiMedia Encyclopedia as early as 1989 (the first one being the Academic American Encyclopedia published by Grolier), but did not launch Britannica CD until 1994, one year after Microsoft launched their Encarta encyclopedia.
Britannica uses a hybrid of British and American English, for example colour (not color), centre (not center), encyclopaedia (not encyclopedia), but civilize (not civilise) and defense (not defence).
The eleventh edition (1910-11) was produced in cooperation with Cambridge University, and though by then ownership of the Britannica had passed to two Americans, Horace Hooper and Walter Jackson, the strength and confidence of much of its writing marked the high point of Edwardian optimism and perhaps of the British Empire itself.
Britannica was an early leader in electronic publishing and new media.
Britannica is also expanding its line of printed products.
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