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Evaluating the Internet

Is the Internet the best information resource for my research? In many instances, it might be but, frequently, books, journals or other print resources can provide better, quicker and even easier solutions. When surfing the Internet, stop and ask yourself some questions before diving into the World-Wide-Web. The table below lists some important issues involved with assessing Internet resources.

How good is the information I can find on any given Web site?
Since Web pages could be written by anyone from school children to Nobel Prize winning scholars, you need to critically evaluate every document you wish to use in your research.

Criterion

Critical questions to ask

Alarms should begin to go off if

Authority

Who  has posted this information on the Internet?

Who  wrote the information?

What  does the author know about this subject?

Is  the author affiliated with a known organization?

There is no author listed.

There is no e-mail contact.

There is no reference to an organizational affiliation.
Purpose

For  what reason has this information been posted?

Is  there bias or prejudice in the treatment of the topic?

Is the page simply designed to be a joke?

The site is selling a product or service.

Extreme opinions are expressed and no other viewpoints offered.
Currency

When  was the document posted on the Web?

When  was it last updated?

How  regularly is other information on the site updated?

The document is several years old.

The site has never been updated.

Everything else on the site is dated.
Format

Is the information text, graphics, audio, or video?

Can  my Web browser handle this type of information?

(ex. Netscape, Mosaic, LINCC, or other browser software have certain limitations)

I need text information and this site only offers graphics or audio (or vice-versa).

The screen prompts me to download a new -plug-in? module for my browser.
Site

Is  the document part of a personal Web page?

Is  it a commercial (.com), educational (.edu), government (.gov), organization (.org) or other site?

 .com  sites frequently have a financial agenda, so beware.(See the Helpful Hints below for more help with site evaluation.)
Relevance

Is  the treatment of my topic appropriate?

Does  this document answer my information needs?

 You've found your search terms in the document, but they are used in a different context.

HELPFUL HINTS:
Currency: Many sites will post a copyright date at the bottom of the home page, or in the link -About Us? that is usually found in the menu. You are looking for either a copyright or revision date to indicate how recently the information was reviewed.

Document Evaluation: Personal Web pages can frequently be easily identifiable. A URL with a tilde, -~? (ex: www.myschool. edu/~Beavis/cool.html) is almost always the personal page of an individual (.edu sites may have pages like this for either students or faculty, so it's good to investigate further). Many companies (ex: GeoCities and AngelFire) offer free Web pages. If you see an ad for free Web hosting, you may be looking at a site which will allow anyone to post anything. Look for -about the author? or -about us? links to learn more about the website creators background and credentials.

Site Evaluation: Various types of Internet institutions have been assigned different suffixes (endings) to their main address (domain).

.aero Air transport: http://nata.aero/ .biz Businesses:www.pet-sitters.biz
.com Commercial: www.publix.com .coop Cooperatives: www.newleafmarket.coop
.edu Educational Institution: www.fsu.edu .gov Government: www.whitehouse.gov
.mil U. S. Military: www.navy.mil .museum Museum: http://fsca.florida.museum
.net Network Services Provider: www.spring.net .org Organization or Association: www.aclu.org

Countries have their own unique suffixes. A few examples are listed below.

.uk United Kingdom .au Australia .ca Canada .ru Russia
.de Germany (Deutchland) .jp Japan .fr France .za South Africa

By developing the ability to think critically about items retrieved from the World-Wide-Web, you'll be able to make smarter selections from among the millions of Internet documents currently available. Your papers will benefit from more accurate research and you'll better satisfy your own personal, academic, and professional information needs.

INTERNET SEARCH TOOLS

There are numerous search tools on the Internet. None are able to cover all of the hundreds of billions of documents on the Web, but some may be better than others. Each of these sites offers -HELP? documentation and advanced search options. If you find a search tool that's appropriate for your individual needs, spend a little bit of time learning more about it.

Type of Tool

DIRECTORY

CRAWLER SEARCH

PORTALS

META SEARCH

Description Information is arranged by humans into categories by subject headings, then sub-headings, then more sub-divisions. An index of sites is automatically generated by electronic 'spiders' which roam the Net collecting words from Web pages. Gateways to the Internet offering search engines and a variety of other features - links, content, & services. Your query is sent through a varying number of search tools, then resulting hits will be displayed in grouped or ranked compilations.
Examples Yahoo ~ About ~ Lycos ~ Looksmart ~ search. MSN ~ vlib.org [VirtualLibrary] AlltheWeb ~ Google ~ Teoma ~ AltaVista ~ Ask.com [Jeeves] AOL ~ MSN ~ refdesk ~ myflorida ~ firstgov.gov ~ verticalportals ~ Vivisimo ~ ez2find ~ IxQuick ~ Kartoo ~ Researchville ~ Surfwax ~ Profusion ~ Dogpile
Good Choice For beginners, or when searching for broad concepts or general topics. For searches containing unique words, or for assistance in composing expertly constructed queries. When the portal matches the subject of your search or contains frequently visited URLS. For the -needle in the haystack? searches. Just one search tool may not have your answer, but a group of them might.
Bad Choice When searching for very specific, unique information. For broad topical searches. For broad topical searches. For broad topical searches.

HELPFUL HINT:  When using any Internet search tool, it's a good strategy to think of your search in terms of its basic components. Every word should represent a part of an overall concept. For example, let's say you're researching the effects of tobacco advertising on children . TOBACCO  and ADVERTISING  and CHILDREN  are all key parts of this question and you want to make certain that any document you retrieve contains all  of these words. Many of these search tools allow you to use the plus  +  sign before a required word in the search. Thus,  +TOBACCO +SMOKING +CHILDREN  will be the search that gets the best results. Don't even bother typing the words on , the ,  a , or other non-essential terms. Concentrate on words that will add real meaning to any documents you wish to find.

SELECT INTERNET SEARCH TOOLS

Yahoo  - www.yahoo.com  -Yahoo may be the best site for beginning Internet users and is still the preference of many veterans. Yahoo ranks tops in consumer popularity, and allows customization of their page. The folks at Yahoo have organized Web sites into subject-related categories and sub-categories so you can browse these categories or  search within Yahoo by using their convenient directory.http://dir.yahoo.com/

Google - www.google.com  - Three times voted "Most Outstanding Search Engine" by Search Engine Watch readers, Google has a well-deserved reputation as the top choice for those searching the web. The crawler-based service provides both comprehensive coverage of the web along with great relevancy. Highly recommended as a first stop in your hunt, whatever you are looking for.

AlltheWeb - www.alltheweb.com  "All the Web, All the Time" An excellent crawler-based search engine, provides both comprehensive coverage of the web and outstanding relevancy. In addition to web page results, AllTheWeb.com provides the ability to search for news stories, pictures, video clips, MP3s and FTP files. Most comprehensive web coverage.

Ask - www.ask.com  - Popular search program that allows "natural language" questions for searching.

Vivisimo - http://vivisimo.com/ - Meta search program that ranks listings without duplicate entries, organizes results categories.

VerticalPortals - www.verticalportals.com  index to over 150 portals by topic.

Global Gateway to Portals to the World - www.loc.gov/rr/international/portals.html  from the Library of Congress.

Virtual Library  - URL: http://www.vlib.org  - The Virtual Library directory offers topical guides to Internet sites of scholarly and research interest, international in coverage.

InvisibleWeb  www.InvisibleWeb.com was a directory of over 10,000 databases, archives, and search engines that contain information that traditional search engines have been unable to access. While it seems to be off-line at this time (May 2010) there is information about the Invisible Web

 updated October 2010