Business encyclopedias

June 5th, 2006

For a long time, I thought it was curious that the vast majority of my Google searches on obscure business terminology have pointed me to the ad-supported Investopedia. I would have assumed that the highest-quality results would come from a community-built site like Wikipedia.

Of course, there’s a good reason behind the phenomenon — taken side-by-side, the lesser-known business terms in Investopedia articles are usually more accurate and more in-depth than the corresponding Wikipedia entry (and therefore more link-worthy, which Google likes). A perfect example is Investopedia’s term of the day: COLI. Try that on Wikipedia and you’ll get a ton of E Coli articles.

Still, it almost seems backwards — anachronistic in a sense. The Wikipdia community has already handed Britannica its lunch…surely the typical community author can find time to refine a few esoteric business references now and then.

Turns out, the typical Wikipedia user might have other interests to cover. I’m a big fan of Woot.com and the Something Awful Forums, but you really have to stand in amazement of the size and effort put forth in their respective Wikipedia articles. While the entertainment value can’t be discounted, you have to wonder how the community benefits by knowing the complete history of the “Bag o’ Crap.”

Will Wikipedia ever surpass sites like Investopedia? I’m not so sure. In the end, specialization = quality. Wikipedia focuses on general information for everything, while Investopedia can choose to focus on a small number of business terms. It’s the same reason why a CPA will be doing my taxes this year — some things are better left to an expert.

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