Yes, but it's harder to use an entry in the OED to send real-time messages to your opium supplier on the outside, coordinate your escape attempt, rob a bank, or open security holes that will allow Russian mobsters to 0wn the paper dictionary and use it to send out ads for authentic-whalebone penis extensions.

(That would be a funny steampunk novel.)

But, yes, this is the guy I had in mind when I said that you have to consider the question on a case-by-case basis.