M-W increasingly stale?
Some of my friends like to turn to Merriam-Webster online for their dictionary work, but now it seems a bit of caution is in order. The latest edition of Copy Editor newsletter notes that with the release of the 11th edition of the Collegiate Dictionary, M-W has stopped offering free access to the updated edition. (If I'm coming late to the party, my apologies, but I haven't seen this written about a lot.)
I checked by entering some of the new words and abbreviations (as common these days as DSL), and sure enough, what came back was a note to see the subscription version ($14.95 a year).
Most people probably aren't looking for words like "pleather," and so the free site likely will remain reliable for common stuff. But the risk is that it will become increasingly stale.
posted by Doug @ 12:26 PM
2 comments|
2 Comments:
Here's why I still use M-W online: that oh-so-convenient toolbar. I can look a word up in a second, and it makes me more likely to look words up at all.
And seldom am I looking up words to find their definition. I usually want to double-check spelling. So even though you won't find out what "pleather" means, you'll still be sure it's spelled right.
If I still need more, I'll go to Dictionary.com.
But we Mac users don't get the joy of that toolbar, so ...
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