Book Business EXTRA! Q&A -- World Books’ Paul Kobasa talks about the changing landscape of encyclopedias
EXTRA! -- What led World Book to develop a site like World Book Kids that was specifically geared toward younger readers?
Kobasa --The Internet experience is not always a rewarding one for children – particularly young children and children who become discouraged by information overload. They are capable of getting online and conducting searches. But often these searches result in a huge number of hits, many of which simply aren’t relevant, are inappropriate for the younger user, or are outdated and otherwise inaccurate. We want to provide young readers with a positive search experience by creating for them an easily navigable environment and content tailored to their comprehension levels and learning modes. We started with our award-winning 13-volume Student Discovery Encyclopedia. But rather than merely producing an online version of it, we worked to make the content come alive by exploiting the capabilities of the online environment.