LIR 10 Week 5

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LIR 10 Week 5

• Searching and Evaluating Information on the
  Internet

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This weeks class

• Class announcements
• Internet directories
• Search engines
• Evaluating Internet Sources
• The hidden Internet?

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Finding Information on the Internet
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What is the Internet?

• Not just World Wide Web
• Communication from user to user telnet, ftp,
  Usenet, MUDs, e-mail
• Web and Internet
• interchangeable?
• WWW only one
• way to communicate
• HTTP

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How is the World Wide Web Organized?
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Its not!!!
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The Internet is not organized!

• Not designed to be organized, searched
• Tools developed

• Subject Directories
• Search Engines

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Subscription Databases vs. Internet Subject
Directories, Search Engines

• Many searchable fields
• Browsable subject
• Free text searches
• Sophisticated search strings

• Subscription Databases created for searching

not found in Internet IFTs
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Internet Directories and Search Engines

• A Quick Guide

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WWW Subject Directories

• Organized collections of web sites, sources
• Browsable, searchable
• Resemble indexes (somewhat)
• Hierarchy of categories
• Definition/scope note
• Selected by humans (usually)

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Directory Elements
directory.google.com

• Search box
• Help Link
• Browsable categories, subcategories
• Advertising (possibly)

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WWW directories are handy

• Browse selective lists, review high quality
  sources
• Narrow broad topics, investigate subtopics
• Timesaving

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Subject Directories tour
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Research Directories

• Noncommercial
• Reliable sites, well organized
• Focus on topics for research
• No fun and games!

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Research Directory Examples

• The Librarians Index to the Internet (LII)
  searchable, annotated subject directory
• Developed, organized, maintained by librarians
• http//www.lii.org

• Internet Public Library
• www.ipl.org
• Intute
• http//www.intute.ac.uk
• GDN
• http//gdnet.org/index.php

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Academic WWW Directories

• Focus on research areas
• Institutionally supported
• Created by librarians, subject specialists
• May have site annotations, scope notes

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Examples of Academic Directories

• SRJC
• http//www.santarosa.edu/library/Refs/index.shtml
• UC System and beyond
• infomine.ucr.edu

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Commercial WWW Directories

• Broad subject areas
• Popular categories
• Semi-selective sites
• Sites based on producer information,
• Unknown criteria

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Commercial WWW Directories

• Caveats
• Can be overwhelming
• Sites not filtered, evaluated
• Mystifying results?
• Advertisers may influence ranking

• When to use
• Scan broad subjects
• Need current information

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Examples of Commercial Directories

• dir.yahoo.com
• directory.google.com
• www.about.com
• For kids www.yahooligans.com

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Yahooligans, before after
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Governmental Directories

• Good sources, wide range of topics
• Library of Congress International Portal
• http//www.loc.gov/rr/international/portals.html
• National Network of Libraries of Medicine
• http//www.nlm.nih.gov/hinfo.html
• Kids.gov
• http//www.kids.gov/

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Cooperative Directories

• Volunteers create, edit topic areas
• Information without promoting/ranking individual
  websites
• Updated constantly?

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Examples of Cooperative WWW Directory

• Open Directory Project
• http//www.dmoz.org
• Wikipedia (kinda sorta) http//en.wikipedia.org/
  wiki/Main_Page
• Dont use Wikipedia for your Internet source
• Wikipedia assignment notes

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Wikipedia Notes

• What is it?
• Acceptable as a source?
• Strengths weaknesses
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vs8O-hv3w-MU

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Using Search Engines
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Handy Search Engine Sources

• SRJCs Search Engine page
• http//www.santarosa.edu/library/Refs/engines.shtm
  l
• Infopeoples Best Search Tools Chart
• http//www.infopeople.org/search/chart.html
• Search Engine Watch, for the completely obsessed
• http//searchenginewatch.com/

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Search Engines

• The Ugly Truth

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How not to use Google

• A quick Google search of liberalism on college
  campuses brings a wealth of good evidence that
  what is being taught on many of them is
  anti-American, anti-religious, anti-Israel,
  pro-gay rights and pro-abortion, often to the
  exclusion and ridicule of opposing views
• -Cal Thomas in his syndicated newspaper
  column, 4/2/2005
• Dont make me Google it!
• -Jessica Simpson, after Nick Lachey refused to
  tell her how to spell the word wounded

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A Google search is not research!

• Research
• Finding, evaluating, understanding variety of
  reliable sources from number of viewpoints
• Good sources reveal where, how information was
  gathered

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A Google search is not research!

• You are smarter than an algorithm
• How you phrase search determines results
• A site's ranking in Google's search results is
  automatically determined by computer algorithms
  using thousands of factors... Sometimes
  subtleties of language cause anomalies to appear
  that cannot be predicted.
• Explanation of Google's Search Results

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A Google search is not research!

• Thomas begins column by referring to academic
  study, published in conservative online journal
• Study follows guidelines for academic research
• Google search does not!

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Also

• The Internet cant spell!
• Google can provide definitions
• Google Search definewounded

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Searching with Search Engines
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Whats a Search Engine?

• Search for web pages, files, documents
• Through specific set of sites (not the entire
  WWW)
• Updated by crawlers (spiders, robots)
• Search for new content, report findings

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Limitations of Popular Search Engines

• In general
• Link to the linked
• Ignore disconnected URLs
• Popularity a factor
• Wont find dynamic pages
• However we need the eggs

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When to use a search engine

• Time to review how best to search
• Survey a lengthy results list
• Examine many sites
• Evaluate quality
• Some knowledge about topic

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Common Features of Search Engines

• Search boxes
• Options to refine searches
• Advanced search techniques
• Help
• use them!

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How to Outsmart Google

• Mall map, Help or Advanced Search

• AND
• Japanese AND camouflage AND skirt
• Japanese camouflage skirt
• NOT
• hip hop NOT bunnies
• hip hop -bunnies

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How to Outsmart Google
OR (north bay OR Sonoma county)
conservation simple synonyms? (women OR
females) AND marketing (women OR females)
marketing
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More Boolean-esque Options

• Phrase searching
• vampire poodles
• night terrors sleep disorders

• Additional limiters
• Domain extension
• Date range
• Language
• Truncation?
• http//www.google.com/advanced_search

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Best Bets

• Phrase search (but be careful)
• oldest profession example
• Limit to .edu or .org or .gov
• Use
• http//www.google.com/help/refinesearch.html

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Google toolbar options (not on Lecture Notes)

• Highlight search terms
• Find word in site
• term sitesantarosa.edu

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Examples of Popular, Quality Search Engines

• www.google.com
• www.altavista.com
• www.ask.com

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Evaluating Internet Sources
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(No Transcript)
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Internet Sources

• Evaluate!
• No standards
• Compare to peer-reviewed journals, academic
  journals
• Excellent Internet evaluation source
• http//www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Int
  ernet/Evaluate.html

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Applying STARTScope/Coverage, Treatment/Reliabili
ty, Authority, Relevancy, Treatment

• to Internet Sources

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Evaluating Internet Sources Scope/Coverage

• Whats covered?
• Overview?
• Detailed information?
• Subtopic?

• Content of
• information

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Scope/Content of Website

• Example
• http//memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/robinson/i
  ndex.html

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Evaluating Internet Sources Scope/Coverage

• Complete or web bites?
• Edited/abridged information with info/ links to
  original documents?
• Brief information sources warning

• Depth of
• information

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Depth of Information Examples

• Deep
• http//www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/zoot/
• Not-so-deep
• http//law.jrank.org/pages/2971/Sleepy-Lagoon-Tria
  ls-1942-43.html

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Evaluating Internet Sources Treatment/Reliability

• Information supported by evidence?
• Non-inflammatory language, reasonable arguments?
• Bias, point of view shown?
• (Wikipedia additions to the class Reader)

Treatment how topic is treated/presented
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Treatment Examples

• Example 1
• The Smoking Section Website about second-hand
  smoke

Since 1979, the number of smokers has declined
significantly, from about33 of adults, or
higher, to a proportion varyingly reported as
being from20 to 25. During the same period, a
host of anti-smoking laws havedramatically
curtailed smoking in public places. Today,
exposure to ETSis not one tenth of what it was in
1979. Yet, according to an article in theSan
Jose Mercury News (October 12, 1993), fatal
asthma attacks have nearlydoubled in that time.
More than 5,100 Americans suffered fatal asthma
attacksin 1991, up from about 2,600 in 1979.
Example 2 The Cigarette Papers
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Evaluating Internet Sources Treatment/Reliability

• Purpose of Web Site
• Provide information?
• Selling a product?
• Arguing a position?
• Advertising clearly distinguishable from content?

• Purpose, perspective, orientation of information

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Purpose of site example

• Example
• http//www.addictionca.com/FAQ-ecstasy.htm
• Can you tell the purpose of the site?
• Google search for this site
• Another Google search
• Should you use this site as a source?

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Evaluating Internet Sources Treatment/Reliability

• Sources cited?
• Enough information to follow up?
• Statistics sources?
• Experts identified?

Reliability trustworthiness of the information
in the source
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Reliability example

• http//www.factcheck.org/richardson_flunks_two_sub
  jects.html

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Evaluating Internet Sources Authority

• Author(s) or source listed? (Clearly?)
• Authors occupation, education, experience?
• Affiliated with known organization, institution?
• Experts w/ subject knowledge?
• Qualifications to address topic?

• Discovering information about the source, author,
  organization, etc.

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Authority Example
http//www.mayoclinic.com/health/AboutThisSite/abo
utthissite
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How to Find WWW Page Sources to Evaluate
Authority

• Check page title, headings, menu, opening
  paragraphs
• Look near top, bottom, navigational bar
• Look for description links
• About the ______ Association"
• "About Us"
• Mission Statement

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Evaluating Authority? Check

• Links to authors faculty/professional pages
• Articles, publications
• Library catalogs, Internet search engines, online
  databases
• No source or author information? Be wary.
• Webmaster not responsible for
• page content
• Examine URL

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Evaluating Internet Sources Authority

• Is it an organizations web site (.org)?
• Is it a governmental web site (.gov)?
• Is it a military web site (.mil)?
• Is it a commercial web site (.com)?
• Is it an educational web site (.edu)?

• URL Clues to the origin of information
• domain extensions

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Deconstructing URLs

• URL Uniform Resource Locator the address of
  web document
• Top Level Domain main subdivision of internet
  addresses
• Check last two or three letters after the final
  dot at the beginning of URL

• Backspace to first section of URL to find main
  page of site
• Restricted .edu, .gov, .mil, .ca, .us
• Unrestricted .net, .org .com
• See ICANN Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) for full
  listings

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Evaluating Internet Sources Relevancy

• How is information relevant to your topic?
• What will you use for your project?
• Statistics?
• Data?
• Facts?
• Opinions?
• HOW does the source support thesis?

• Usefulness of information
• to you!

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Relevancy example

• Example
• http//www.thereminworld.com/article.asp?id17

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Evaluating Internet Sources Timeliness

• Information Currency
• Date was site created?
• Last updated, revised?
• Information cited still valid?
• Current References
• Links to other web pages current/active?

• Currency of information

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Navigating Web PagesClosed for Renovation!
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Cite that Site!
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Citing a Site

• Baseball, the Color Line and Jackie Robinson.
  Baseball and Jackie Robinson. Library of Congress
  American Memory. 2 Oct. 2007. lthttp//memory.loc.
  gov/ammem/collections/robinson/jr1940.htmlgt

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Formatting notes for URLs

• Remove hyperlinks (disable links)

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Other Internet Sources
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When you search with a search engine, you are not
searching the entire Internet
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Estimated over 80 of information available is
invisible to search engines
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The Hidden Web

• Or, the Invisible Web or Deep Web or Deep Matter

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No matter what you call it

• Its not a secret!
• Whats not retrieved

• Thousands of specialized databases, dynamic
  pages, files millions of records

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The Hidden Internet, cont.

• Hidden databases produced by

• Universities
• Libraries
• Associations
• Businesses
• Government agencies

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Great article on the Invisible Web

• Chris Sherman and Gary Price
• The Invisible Web Uncovering Sources Search
  Engines Cant See
• From Library Trends
• Lets find it!

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Invisible Web Search Tools

• http//www.lii.org
• infomine.ucr.edu
• http//www.completeplanet.com
• http//www.intute.ac.uk
• http//gdnet.org/index.php
• (Caveat searching the last site is challenge!)

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Personal WWW Directories

• Specific topic areas
• Special interest

• Quirky
• Unlovely (design issues)

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Examples of Personal WWW Directories

• Matt Drudges Dad (its okay, hes a librarian)
• www.refdesk.com
• Gary Price, Hidden Web Guru
• http//www.freepint.com/gary/direct.htm

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Other Sources of Information on the Internet

• Metasearch Engines
• Newsgroups and Listservs
• Blogs
• News search engines

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1. Metasearch Engines

• Sends your keywords to several search engines at
  the same time
• Return a single list of results from multiple
  sources
• Source engine identified (most of the time)

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Standard Search Engines

• Search for keywords, number of times within
  document
• Keywords from a single (updated) database of
  websites
• Each search engine searches unique selection of
  web pages
• Results ranked and sorted
• Robots or spiders find new websites

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Metasearch Engines

• Transmits searches simultaneously to
  several search engines
• Results gathered from engines queried
• Search terms sent to indexes maintained by
  traditional search engines
• Pros and Cons?

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Metasearch Engines Examples

• Directory
• http//www.santarosa.edu/library/Refs/engines.shtm
  l
• http//www.metacrawler.com/
• http//www.dogpile.com/
• http//ixquick.com/
• http//www.webcrawler.com/

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2. Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

• Newsgroups
• Worldwide bulletin board systems
• Tens of thousands of forums (newsgroups)
• Groups focus on wide range of topics, accessible
  to anyone everyone

• Bulletin board style original and follow-up
  postings
• Not subscription based

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Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

• Mailing Lists
• Automated mailing list distribution systems
• Subscribe" to discussion lists
• Distributed to the entire subscriber base via
  e-mail

• Discussion groups
• Wide-ranging
• Subscription-based

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Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

• Pros
• Good for locating professional discussions
• Interactive, questions welcome
• Collaborative
• Alternative voices
• Cyber-networking

• Cons
• Unmoderated or lightly moderated forums
• On the Internet, no one knows youre a dog.
• Can be difficult to search

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Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

• Accessible mailing lists by Catalist
  http//www.lsoft.com/lists/listref.html
• Google groups (the Usenet)
• http//groups.google.com
• Usenet history http//www.ibiblio.org/usenet-i/
• Yahoo groups
• http//groups.yahoo.com
• Topica lists http//lists.topica.com/
• About.com forums http//www.about.com

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Other Ways to Find Collaborative Sources

• Search Google or other search engines for forums.
  For example
• PDF forums
• Search Google or other search engines for
  discussion groups. For example
• Gardening discussion groups

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Newsgroup and Mailing List Search Examples

• Google Groups (Usenet)
• Catalist Listserv search
• http//www.lsoft.com/lists/listref.html

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3. Weblogs or Blogs

• Online journals, updated often
• News-oriented
• Contain commentary and links
• Personal or professional focus

• Pros
• Alternative sources
• Constantly updated
• Wide range of topics
• Cons
• Difficult to search
• Too much information
• Reliability of authors
• Feeding Frenzy

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Weblog Sources

• Google Directory
• http//directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Interne
  t/On_the_Web/Weblogs/
• DMOZ Weblog listing
• http//dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/
• IPL Blog Page
• http//www.ipl.org/div/blogs
• Search Google or other search engines for weblogs
  or blogs. For example
• Gardening weblogs

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Homework for Next Week

• Read through UC Berkeleys Internet Evaluation
  Site
• Listen to Talk of the Nation Wikipedia show
• (Click on the Listen icon at the top of the
  page story is about 30 minutes long)
• and/or read the transcript of the show
• Complete Internet Quiz

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Homework for Next Week

• Internet Source Assignment
• May e-mail before 3/12
• Final Project Due!

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See you next week!