Like print materials, web pages must be evaluated for their usefulness in research. However, critically evaluating web pages can be more crucial since anyone who can learn HTML (or has a HTML editor) can make information available on the Web. In the print world there are editors, reviewers, and fact-checkers who check for quality and accuracy of information presented; on the Web, such checking typically does not occur, so it is up to you to analyze the pages. Web pages should be evaluated from the following criteria:

Author | "Publisher" |Intended Audience |Purpose and Objectivity | Coverage |Currency | Accuracy

Author

• Who wrote the page?
• What is the author's background? Does this make him/her qualified to write on the subject?
• Have you seen this author's name in other sources?
• Is the author affiliated with a larger institution?
• Is there contact information for the author (e-mail as well as regular mailing address)?

Sometimes this information is not obvious on the web page. You might be able to find more information about the author or institution by following back the directories in the URL that lead to the page.

Example: you are looking at
http://www.ai.mit.edu/people/ellens/Gender/pap/pap.html
http://www.ai.mit.edu/people/ellens

By chopping off the "Gender/pap/pap.html" part of the URL, we come to the directory of "ellens," which gives us information about the author and her qualifications.

The above URL also illustrates what a URL for a personal web page looks like; the directory "people" indicates that it is a personal web page. URLs that have a tilde ~ followed by a name also represent personal web pages. Just because a page is a personal web page doesn't mean that it is not a valid source for information--scholars and researchers are often given a personal account on their university's web server where they will collect information on their subject specialty. However, some people do not have the qualifications necessary to be trusted sources of information; therefore it is important to investigate their background to make an assessment.

"Publisher"

In the print world, the publisher's name can be an indication of the quality of the information provided. Most people would be more willing to believe information in a book published by a university press than information found in the National Enquirer. In the Web world, the web server is the equivalent to a publisher. The web server's domain can help in assessing the reliability of the information.

.edu an educational or research institution

.com a commercial enterprise, including companies, newspapers, commercial Internet Service Providers

.gov a governmental body

.mil a military body

.net an Internet Service Provider that is not a commercial service

.org a not-for-profit organization

While there are unreliable authors in all domains, information found on a .edu or .gov site is more likely to be reliable. Information on .org sites may be bias toward a particular agenda; .com sites may stretch the truth to sell a product.  There are also many new domain names developing.   Go to: www.icann.org/tlds and review the seven newly approved top-level domain names.  Ideally, these new domain names will help to further clarify the purpose of a site.

Intended Audience

• Who is this page for? Experts, novices, professionals, or hobbyists?
• How does the intended audience effect the reliability of the information?
• How does it effect your ability to understand the page?

Some further tutorials on Web page evaluation:

• What to Look for in a Website University of Michigan Library
  This page shows how to look at web pages critically by listing questions to ask and providing examples.
• The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly or, Why It's a Good Idea to Evaluate Web Sources New Mexico State University Library
  This guide illustrates the importance of evaluating information found on the web with example web pages.
• Examples from Evaluating Web Pages: Links to Examples of Various Concepts (Widener University).

		University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Library Gateway Comments to: jstraw@uiuc.edu Last updated 10/2/2002 KG