Of course, major reference works are also available on CD-ROM, such as the Science Citation Index and the Oxford English Dictionary. These are being joined by a growing number of encyclopedias, including Microsoft's Encarta (based on the Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia), Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia, and the New Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia.
"Multimedia" is the buzzword of choice for these latter publications because they boast not only articles and illustrations, as in the print versions, but also audio narrations, animations, and even video clips. It is debatable whether these multimedia applications truly "bring the book to life," as the publishers tend to claim. You can access tens of thousands of articles on the CD-ROM encyclopedias, but the number of video clips ranges anywhere from 20 to 80. Nevertheless, the multimedia bells and whistles are diverting and make browsing more fun. It is interesting to note that the CD-ROM edition of Encyclopaedia ...
