The Encyclopedia Britannica has launched a program allowing free access to their online edition for ‘web publishers’ and their readers. I have submitted gray/matter for registered access, which if approved will allow you to read any linked articles without an account. The goal is to provide some alternative background references besides the obligatory Wikipedia, which arguably outstrips the EB in breadth but not in depth or validation (the crux being Wikipedia’s uneven record for veracity).

britannicanet.com

No word yet on whether WebShare access would allow anything like A. J. Jacobs’ quest to become The Know-It-All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World by reading through the entire collection.

I’ve started overhauling the site - using a new theme, switching to a sidebar orientation, converting previous categories to tags - in an effort to make it simpler to post shorter pieces. My momentum has been caught up in collecting material to write about with the actual composition seeming difficult with the long-form orientation I had adopted. So you should start to see a more typical linkblog structure interspersed with occasional essays and reviews.

I had not previously tested rigorously enough the process of registering to post comments, and I suspect that the email notices containing initial passwords were not being delivered due to the nonstandard MTA I have running. I switched the SMTP settings around and it should now complete the registration process. In case, you know, that was why anyone was waiting. (more…)

A forum with purpose TBD.