Evaluating internet sources for academic work

Internet Source Evaluation:  A Checklist - In order to write a paper that provides strong evidence for the point that you are making in your thesis, you must choose the best sources available. Using the following checklist, let's look at some ways to evaluate Internet sources for an academic paper.

·       Relevance: Does the website provide information that you need? Does it answer questions that your research poses? The website should not just be another source to put on your list. The sources you choose should provide important information that can be used in your writing.

·       Author: It is helpful to know who the author is when evaluating a website.

  Is the author of the website identified? Sometimes, the "author" is the organization that posted the site and no one person is given credit. You then have to consider the credibility of the organization before dismissing the website as useless or deciding it is your best source.

  Does the author/s have credentials in the field about which s/he is writing? In other words, if you have to choose between a ten-year-old girl's Internet website about George Lucas' novels and movie series, Star Wars, or a well-known literary scholar's journal article published on the Internet about Star Wars and the hero's journey, you would choose the journal article written by the literary scholar.

·       Credibility: This aspect of source evaluation is especially important for Internet sites. Is there contact information for the publisher/author of the website? Does the contact email address or other contact information work? If there is a link to the author's email address, can you email the author and get a response? If any of these questions is not answered with a "yes," then this website may not be not credible and you should not use it for college or employment-related research.

·       Publication date: Is there a clear publication date? Has the website been updated in the last year? Information is considered more reliable if the publication date is recent and if the web page itself has been updated recently or frequently. For some fields of study, like biology, the publication date is extremely important since new research is published frequently in the sciences.

·       Audience: For whom was the information written? The answer might be for specialists in the field, for amateurs, or for children. If you are writing for an academic or professional audience, the information needs to be more detailed, accurate, and sophisticated than if the website is providing information for a fan club or a private audience. For example, a person's homepage usually does not have strong enough proofs for most academic essays, and many teachers will not accept these as valid sources. Make sure that the material is appropriate in level of depth and breadth for the academic topic you are researching.

·       Length: Is the website or web page very short? A one-page website might not provide enough information for you to fully understand the topic presented. Is the web page or website detailed enough to provide the breadth and depth of information about your subject that you need? Does the shorter website make up for brevity by linking you to other, more helpful websites? If it does, this website might be considered a good portal to other sources and, therefore, might be appropriate to bookmark for later reference or even to cite if you actually use it for your writing.

·       Website Type Identifier: Every website has a URL, which is its address. The ending is comprised of three letters (.xxx) that indicate what type of organization is publishing the website itself. From these letters, web users get important clues about the nature of the sites' content. Here are some of the most common endings:

  .gov (government)

  .edu (educational)

  .com (commercial or personal)

  .net (network or portal opening; sometimes a personal website)

  .org (non-profit organization)

  .mil (military)

  Every one of these website types is published by people with their own purpose. You should keep the author (or group) in mind as you read the information on any site. For example, you might get different information about an election on a .gov site than you might on a.edu site.

 Of these website endings, the most common is the .com ending. Some people believe that .com websites are the least credible and scholarly websites available because the writers may have a "for profit" agenda or motive. This is because almost anyone can get a .com website, while .gov, .edu, or .org websites are only given out to certain groups. Yet, many .com websites have a lot of research and thought in them. Some actually are the search engines that will lead you to your ultimate research goals (like altavista.com). Thus, not all commercial sites lack credibility. In fact, the best researchers may have preferences in types of websites, but they understand that each site should be evaluated on the basis of the bias and agenda of the authors.

·       Source Type: Frankly, one of the weaknesses of the Internet is that anyone at all can create and post a web page. That weakness is also one of the Internet's greatest strengths, however. The Internet allows many people research ideas and to voice their thoughts. Therefore, when your source is a website, you must evaluate it thoroughly: Is this site an example of the Internet's weaknesses or strengths? Ask yourself all of the questions in the checklist above and answer them honestly. The website you have found may have wonderful content, but no author; yet, if the posting organization is the "author," and the organization itself is credible, then the site may be credible. 

        Tip: In order to use an Internet source with confidence, you will want to be sure that the source meets most of the criteria in this checklist. (Source:  Smarthinking Writer's Handbook/Using the Internet Wisely; http://services.smarthinking.com/static/Document_Library/docs/writeman/contents.cfm)