INFORMATION ON THE WEB

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INFORMATION ON THE WEB

• EVALUATING WEBSITES

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On the Internet, Nobody
Knows You're a Dog
Cartoon by Peter Steiner reproduced from page 61
of July 5, 1993 issue of The New Yorker, (Vol.69
(LXIX) no. 20).
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Why use the internet?

• 800 million documents are now out there
• Information is probably doubling per year
• 1.5 million web pages are added daily

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Tracking Down Information
Statistics http//www.census.gov/
News http//www.nyt.com
Images http//ditto.com
Reference http//www.britannica.com
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Links to Sept. 11 ---

• Memorial Services for FDNY
• www.ci.nyc.ny.us/html/memorial/index.htm
• Charity Efforts http//www.wtc-aid.org
• Geography, topography and history of Afghanistan
  http//www.maps.com
• First person accounts
• http//www.npr.org/news/specials/americatransforme
  d/
• Slide shows, summaries, graphics, and photo
  essays, and updated timeline http//nyt.com/pages
  /national/dayofterror/

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Online Research Findings

• Internet sources are used more often than
  scholarly resources in papers
• Students prefer electronic resources
• Students are using unreliable sources
• Theres confusion about what to cite and how to
  cite it?
• Theres a gap between what instructors expect and
  students actually use

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--http//people.cornell.edu/pages/pmd8/The Effect
of the Web on Undergraduate Citation Behavior
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Research Using the Internet

• The average lifespan of a website is 6 years.
• Everyone has the authority to publish anything on
  the web.
• There are no fact-checkers or editors to question
  objectivity of material.
• There are no web standards to confirm accuracy of
  a site.

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Authority, Objectivity Accuracy
http//www.martinlutherking.org/ vs. http//www.th
ekingcenter.com/
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UConn Library Homepage
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Academic Sources

• Resources by Subjects
• Government Information
• Electronic Reference Shelf

Targeted to UConn library users identifies
essential academic resources
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Internet Search Tools
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check your sources

• ? Ulrich's Periodicals Directory to
• see whether a magazine or journal
• exists.
• Location Stamford Reference Desk,
• Call Number Z6941 .U5,
• Library Has39th Edition (2001)
• Encyclopedia of Associations (Associations
  Unlimited) to see if an association exists
• Internet Source ? Institute for Historical
  Review (IHR)

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Paper Mills
...more that 25,000 free papers ..
Topic Emily Dickinson
price per page
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Paper Mills Reality

• The average cost for a 10
• page paper is over 84
• Papers are old (1982)
• Quality is judged mediocre
• Papers circulate
• in many sites
• Most references are either inaccurate or dont
  exist

Doe, John, "Plato's Republic and the New
German Term paper downloaded from
http//www.schoolsucks.com Nov. 23, 1998.
Bibliography
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Key to Citing Electronic Sources

• Basic Title, Author, Publication Information
• Author or Organization
• Date of Last Update
• URL / Web Page Address
• Date of Access
• Keep a printed copy of the first
• page to document your search

82 of URLs cited lead to the wrong Internet
document
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Citation Sources
On-line Resources for Documenting Electronic
Sources http//owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/res
earch/r_docelectric.html NoodleTools (MLA
Interactive Bibliography) http//www.noodletools.c
om/ UConn Library Guides APA Citations
http//www.lib.uconn.edu/storrs/APAcitat.pdf MLA
Citations http//www.lib.uconn.edu/storrs/MLAbibl
i.PDF Turabian Style http//www.lib.uconn.edu/sto
rrs/Turabbib.PDF
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Sites
Reference http//www.britannica.com News http//
www.nyt.com Statistics http//www.census.gov Grap
hics http//ditto.com UConn http//www.uconn.edu
Search Engines http//www.google.com
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Help?
Questions/Comments Contact shelley.roseman_at_uconn.
edu tel. [phone]