I would still invest those resources into documenting more knowledge that currently doesn't exist online on their original languages and immediately translating to English. For better or for worse English is the "abstract" representation of language online and there's so much absent stuff that worrying about another universal format seems pointless.
It's not either/or. Different groups of people can do different things at once. And of the two things you're comparing, one is expert technical/engineering and the other requires expert archivists/translators. They're totally different groups.
