Franklin's Merriam Webster's English Dictionary - only for some Overly Niche Market?
I have a printed copy of the fantastic Websters Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged - most of it still dates to 1963, and words like "Internet" are still in the addendum; but there is still nothing like the kind of illustrations they give you for each word and phrase. If you have always regretted that you weren't well-read enough or widely read, all you have to do is gloss through this American English dictionary, and you'll see the most wonderful obscure ideas and thoughts from all of human history arrayed before you in the most delightful and surprising nooks and crannies - all to help you see how the words you are interested in come to be used. But that 3500-page volume, can get to be a bit much to flip through, to carry, and if (as I did) you happen to get careless and let one side of the book hang over the edge of the table, this dictionary could be a bit much to have crash to the floor. So using the CD-ROM version installed on your notebook or netbook could be ideal. You just need to pay for the CD-ROM, and the gadget you install it on, is probably something you have already.
But the folks at Franklin's who have long made pocket translators and dictionaries for travelers, feel it might be worth a shot putting out that Webster's Unabridged English dictionary on its own netbook-shaped device, and offering it to you for something between $250 and $300. Certainly, you might argue that there is something lost in moving from a printed dictionary where you can actually touch the words, where the words reassure you by not disappearing before your very eyes when you shut the book. But that reassurance is something that anyone should be able to give up, for the convenience of reducing this 7 pound bag of bricks, to a slim and sleek random-access module. As much use as I got out of my "real" dictionary, I haven't looked at it in a while, ever since I installed the software version on my EeePC.
Maybe Franklin thought, that people needed a dictionary, a presence that was always there, the way books are. As easily available as dictionary software is for use on all manner of computing devices, they still felt that putting out a dedicated device, for about the same price as a full-featured versatile one, was a good idea. Maybe they'll prove themselves right; but as far as I can see, they seem to have lost the plot. There is nothing wrong with their English dictionary per se - it has three-quarters of a million definitions, a half-million-strong thesaurus, and random-access. The problem is Franklin's device itself. It is, as I said before, the shape of the netbook, with a proper QWERTY keyboard, and scroll buttons. But the screen is the kind you saw on calculators and digital watches from a really long time ago - a grayish-green background that black pixelated text appears on.
Even your mobile now has a high definition full-color full-motion screen that you could look up dictionary apps on or use the Internet dictionary websites on. Who on earth would want to carry a whole new device just a look up a few words on the screen like that? It does make you wonder how these companies actually use their market research and focus-group dollars. If you happen to have a lot of money lying spare, and you love word exploration, you might be tempted, but the moment you look at the impracticality of a carrying it around, you're sure to think better of it. And the worst part? It comes at a time when Apple's iPad with that gorgeous touch-screen is just around the corner, for about the same price.