Wikipedia received 97 percent of the visits U.S. Web surfers made to online encyclopedias last week, Web monitoring company Hitwise Friday.

MSN Encarta was second with 1.27 percent of visits, followed by Encyclopedia.com (0.76 percent), Fact Monster (0.72 percent) and, in fifth place, Britannica.com (0.57 percent). Britannica.com's share of U.S. visits dropped 53 percent last month compared with December 2007, Hitwise said.

Australia's Sydney Morning Herald published Thursday with Encyclopaedia Britannica President Jorge Cauz in which he reiterated that the site would begin accepting contributions and edits from the public. He also blasted Google for routinely placing Wikipedia in its top results for many queries.

Although the article got a lot of attention, Encyclopaedia Britannica had announced its intention to revamp its Web site to give users more participation in June 2008 in a statement titled "."

In fact, the company reacted to Thursday's coverage with a note on its official blog providing about the timeline for the rollout of the Web site changes.