Towards a New Concept of Open Access Online Encyclopaedia :A Case Study from Croatia The Role of Encyclopaedias Today 1

Professionally edited open access online encyclopaedias enable a systemic and reliable orientation within the ever-increasing amount of data and information on the Internet. Providing access to scientifically verified information, they represent an important part of the research and didactic infrastructure. This paper demonstrates the activities of Croatia’s Miroslav Krleža Institute of Lexicography aimed at exploring the new encyclopaedic concept in the digital age. The Institute’s digital transformation is shown, which involves the digitisation and online publishing of archival editions, publishing of the permanently updated online general encyclopaedia, and the transformation of specialised encyclopedias to the encyclopaedic portals. Encyclopaedic portals could represent a new concept of encyclopaedias in the digital realm by serving as platforms for data networking and sharing, a sort of ‘junction points’ that connect diverse digital content on a specific topic. Institute’s publicly available repository of encyclopaedic knowledge enables the linking to the digital data and collections of other research and cultural institutions; therefore the collaborative projects aimed at reinforcing digital research and cultural infrastructure will be described. Thanks to the properties of the digital media and increasing connectivity, a closer collaboration Towards a New Concept of Open Access Online Encyclopaedia : A Case Study from... between professionally edited online encyclopaedias across Europe (and beyond) is enabled. This paper elaborates a range of initiatives seeking to build connections across individual European and North American national encyclopaedias, focusing on the role that Croatian encyclopaedistics plays in this endeavour.