Good article in the Wall St. Journal about Vicipapeida, a Latin version of Wikipedia. While, the number of entries is still modest (the 57th largest, tucked between Azeri and Ido), the active users dilligently try to use an ancient language to keep up with modern articles. For example, information about Britney Spears can be found under Britannia Spears.

From the article:

It’s not that ancient Romans didn’t know a thing or two about wild sex. They had their Bacchanalia, after all. But lacking video technology, they had no expression for “sex tape.” And that is why writing about Paris Hilton in Latin can sometimes be so difficillimum.

The editors of Vicipaedia Latina, the Latin version of the popular Wikipedia Internet reference site, were thus forced to wing it. In their article about the hotel heiress, they described Ms. Hilton’s famous X-rated Web video as pellicula in interrete vulgate de coitu Paridis.

Which means, more or less, “the widely disseminated Internet movie of Paris’s sex.”

Improvising like that is necessary when using the language of chariots and togas to account for the world of SUVs and navel piercings.