 | This article needs to be updated.(August 2018) |
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Type of site | |
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| Owner | IAC |
| URL | www |
| Launched | February 1997 |
Reference.com is an online encyclopedia that organizes content that uses a question-and-answer format. Articles are organized into hierarchical categories.
Before IAC restructured the site following an acquisition in 2008, Reference.com comprised multiple reference works, and disclosed its sources.
Reference.com was launched by InReference, Inc in February 1997. [1] The site was later acquired by Lexico Publishing Group, LLC. In 2005, Lexico announced that Reference.com would begin offering searches of Wikipedia content. [2]
The popularity of Dictionary.com had been greatly boosted by Google's practice of offering a link at the top of their search results that goes to the Dictionary.com definition.[ citation needed ] This exclusive relationship was terminated without explanation to the public when the Google links were redirected to definitions at Answers.com. (In December 2009, the Answers.com links were replaced with Google's own dictionary.) Google added a Dictionary.com definition link for certain search words in a non-exclusive relationship (along with links to definitions from a few other commercial reference websites). On 3 July 2008, IAC acquired Lexico Publishing Group, LLC and its three properties: Thesaurus.com, Reference.com, and Dictionary.com. [3] [4]
Reference.com reproduced content from external sources. [5] The site's sources included other online dictionaries, encyclopedias, and a search of terms found on other websites such as Wikipedia and the CIA World Factbook. The site could also search Usenet groups and other mailing lists. [6] [7]
The encyclopedia had articles from such sources as the 2004 Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, the Crystal Reference Encyclopedia, and later the English Wikipedia. Its online dictionary indexed the American Heritage Dictionary , Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary , the Jargon File, the Kernerman English Multilingual Dictionary, Acronym Finder, Stedman's Medical Dictionary , Merriam-Webster's Medical Dictionary, the On-line Medical Dictionary, and WordNet . Its thesaurus was based on multiple versions of Roget's Thesaurus . The site's web directory was an interface to the Open Directory Project, and its web search feature used Google Search. An interface to Google Translate was added in 2008. [8]
Reference.com in 2010 topped the list compiled by The Wall Street Journal ranking websites by how many third-party tracking cookies were added to the user's computer. Reference.com added 234 tracking cookies when encountering a first-time user. [9]
A frequently asked questions (FAQ) list is often used in articles, websites, email lists, and online forums where common questions tend to recur, for example through posts or queries by new users related to common knowledge gaps. The purpose of a FAQ is generally to provide information on frequent questions or concerns; however, the format is a useful means of organizing information, and text consisting of questions and their answers may thus be called a FAQ regardless of whether the questions are actually frequently asked.
A wiki is an online hypertext publication collaboratively edited and managed by its own audience, using a web browser. A typical wiki contains multiple pages for the subjects or scope of the project, and could be either open to the public or limited to use within an organization for maintaining its internal knowledge base.
The World Wide Web (WWW), commonly known as the Web, is an information system enabling information to be shared over the Internet through simplified ways meant to appeal to users beyond IT specialists and hobbyists, as well as documents and other web resources to be accessed over the Internet according to specific rules, the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP).
A web browser is an application for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on a range of devices, including desktops, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. In 2020, an estimated 4.9 billion people have used a browser. The most used browser is Google Chrome, with a 65% global market share on all devices, followed by Safari with 18%.
Spamdexing is the deliberate manipulation of search engine indexes. It involves a number of methods, such as link building and repeating unrelated phrases, to manipulate the relevance or prominence of resources indexed in a manner inconsistent with the purpose of the indexing system.
MediaWiki is free and open-source wiki software originally developed by Magnus Manske for use on Wikipedia on January 25, 2002 and further improved by Lee Daniel Crocker, after which it has since been coordinated by the Wikimedia Foundation. It powers most websites hosted by the Foundation including Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikimedia Commons, Wikiquote, Meta-Wiki and Wikidata, which define a large part of the set requirements for the software.
Ask.com is a question answering–focused e-business founded in 1996 by Garrett Gruener and David Warthen in Berkeley, California.
This is a comparison of both historical and current web browsers based on developer, engine, platform(s), releases, license, and cost.
The Free Dictionary is an American online dictionary and encyclopedia that aggregates information from various sources. It is accessible in fourteen languages.
Dictionary is an application developed by Apple Inc. as a part of macOS. The application provides definitions and synonyms from various dictionaries, Wikipedia articles and a glossary of Apple-related terms.
Dictionary.com is an online dictionary whose domain was first registered on May 14, 1995. The primary content on Dictionary.com is a proprietary dictionary based on Random House Unabridged Dictionary, with editors for the site providing new and updated definitions. Supplementary content comes from the Collins English Dictionary, American Heritage Dictionary and others.
Lexico was a dictionary website that provided a collection of English and Spanish dictionaries produced by Oxford University Press (OUP), the publishing house of the University of Oxford. While the dictionary content on Lexico came from OUP, this website was operated by Dictionary.com, whose eponymous website hosts dictionaries by other publishers such as Random House. The website was closed and redirected to Dictionary.com on 26 August 2022.
Baidu Baike is a semi-regulated Chinese-language collaborative online encyclopedia owned by the Chinese technology company Baidu. The beta version was launched on April 20, 2006, and the official version was launched on April 21, 2008, edited by registered users. As of February 2022, it has 25.54 million entries and more than 7.5 million editors. It has the largest number of entries in the world of any Chinese-language online encyclopedia.
The history of wikis began in 1994, when Ward Cunningham gave the name "WikiWikiWeb" to the knowledge base, which ran on his company's website at c2.com, and the wiki software that powered it. The wiki went public in March 1995, the date used in anniversary celebrations of the wiki's origins. c2.com is thus the first true wiki, or a website with pages and links that can be easily edited via the browser, with a reliable version history for each page. He chose "WikiWikiWeb" as the name based on his memories of the "Wiki Wiki Shuttle" at Honolulu International Airport, and because "wiki" is the Hawaiian word for "quick".
Knol was a Google project that aimed to include user-written articles on a range of topics. The lower-case term knol, which Google defined as a "unit of knowledge", referred to an article in the project. Knol was often viewed as a rival to Wikipedia.
MicrosoftEncarta is a discontinued digital multimedia encyclopedia published by Microsoft from 1993 to 2009. Originally sold on CD-ROM or DVD, it was also available online via annual subscription, although later articles could also be viewed for free online with advertisements. By 2008, the complete English version, Encarta Premium, consisted of more than 62,000 articles, numerous photos and illustrations, music clips, videos, interactive content, timelines, maps, atlases and homework tools.
DuckDuckGo (DDG) is an internet privacy company. DuckDuckGo offers a number of products oriented towards helping people protect their privacy online, most notably, a private search engine, a tracker-blocking browser extension, email protection and app tracking protection for Android.
Web tracking is the practice by which operators of websites and third parties collect, store and share information about visitors’ activities on the World Wide Web. Analysis of a user's behaviour may be used to provide content that enables the operator to infer their preferences and may be of interest to various parties, such as advertisers. Web tracking can be part of visitor management.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and a topical guide to Wikipedia:
Mindspark Interactive Network, Inc. was an operating business unit of IAC known for the development and marketing of entertainment and personal computing software, as well as mobile application development. Mindspark's mobile division acquired iOS application developer Apalon in 2014, which was known for popular entertainment applications such as Weather Live, Emoji Keypad, and Calculator Pro.
The one site that installed the most was Dictionary.com. A visit to Dictionary.com resulted in 234 trackers being installed on our test computer, and only 11 of those were installed by Dictionary.com. ... So on Dictionary.com, the vast majority of the trackers (200 out of 234) were installed by companies that the person visiting the site probably had never heard of."
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