Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that depends on volunteers to create its content, is now utilizing some of those volunteers to create a static version. Since its inception in 2001, the reference site has grown to more than 1.7 million articles just in English. The new DVD will concentrate on about 2,000 articles, with emphasis on mostly unchangeable topics such as geography and literature.

With a preliminary CD version already available for $13.99, the company is hoping that those without Internet access might be interested. We find a couple of hitches to that plan already. First of all, the CD version is so far only available through the project’s web site, and secondly, the only CD player some of us have is on our computer.