The internet is threatening the dictionary. Can we still save it?

When did you last use a dictionary? Whichever the brand, be that Oxford or Macquarie? Maybe last year? Maybe two years ago? Truth being, you can’t remember. That ritual of sifting the alphabet, finding the page, then sliding your gaze from euphoria to Eurasia to eureka – your target word – is lost in time.

Here’s a second question: when did you last check a word? Whichever the site, be that Urban Dictionary or Wikipedia? You’ll say “the other day.” Perhaps Google Overview defined rizz in its knowledge box. Or maybe ChatGPT unpacked oligarchy. Helped you distinguish discreet from discrete.

For that’s the paradox. Stefan Fatsis, author of Unabridged: The Thrill of (and Threat to) the Modern Dictionary (Atlantic Monthly Press, 2025) reckons: “At a time when contentious words dominate our conversations – think insurrection and fascism and fake news and woke – the need for dictionaries to chronicle and explain language, and serve as its watchdog, has never been greater.”

Yet dictionaries are battling to survive. The nub is revenue. For research, Fatsis loitered in the offices of Merriam-Webster, seeing how one noble lexicon is weathering the millennial storm. Shakily, in a word. Sagging sales and staff cuts have eroded the business model, just as streaming strangled the video store.

Though losing a tangible copy of Matilda is small beer compared to losing “an authoritative, standard reference for Australian English”, argues Victoria Morgan, the Macquarie Dictionary’s executive editor. Jeopardising that ideal is the profit puzzle for online resources, plus the AI incursion “with no dependency on currency, regionalism or reputation”.

If outer space is up for sale, then why not language?

Morgan again: “The web has affected the speed at which language travels around the world, and across varieties of English.” Yet the same web, despite all its language benefits, also menaces the houses that fed its database in the first place. Since Collins and Chambers are less brands than houses, they exist as authorities foremost and companies second. Yet short of market-proofing a lexicon via public or private funding, the bottom line will remain profit rather than zymurgy (the study of fermentation).

Amanda Laugesen, director of the Australian National Dictionary Centre (ANDC), knows that chilly truth firsthand. In late July, her offices were doomed for closure due to cost-cutting measures by ANU, its mother campus. Existentialism, always a popular look-up in Dictionary Land, haunted the corridors for months until a mystery donation bought a reprieve. For now.

As Laugesen says “the ANU is not the only university to be challenged by financial and governance crises – higher education and, in particular, the humanities, are under siege”. As is English, by extension, or any language. More than verbs and nouns, the ANDC is a research hub, tracing the cultural roots and values of our words over time.

In Laugesen’s opinion, “most Australians still feel a strong sense of ‘linguistic nationalism’ – we don’t want our language taken over by British or American English. And we shouldn’t want our language resources dominated by algorithms and AI models that are skewed towards British and US English – which they currently are.”

At heart, the deeper issue is ownership. If outer space is up for sale, then why not language? The verb to be? Does Australian English belong to its writers and speakers, or will it fall to the whims of neoliberal crapbots? (two more recent entries for Macquarie). To answer those questions, maybe start with a dictionary.

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