The UC Berkley Library and the Johns Hopkins University Libraries have excellent guides to evaluating web sources.
ELEMENTS OF INTERNET SOURCES
One of the first things to check a Web document for are its three main elements: head, body and footer:
Within each of these pieces you should be able to determine the following vital elements for evaluating information:
If you are unable to locate all of these elements on an individual Web page, try manipulating the address to dig deeper into the Web site. For example, if no sponsoring institution or author information was found at the URL:
http://www.fred.com/staff/smith/riot.html
Then, try opening the URL minus the "riot.html" filename, e.g.:
http://www.fred.com/staff/smith/
Once you identify all the elements, you can evaluate the document using the guideline listed below.
INTERNET SOURCE EVALUATION CHECKLIST
AUTHOR
LOCAL INSTITUTION OR HOME PAGE
DOCUMENT INFORMATION
CONCLUSION
Given all the information you determined from above, is this piece of information appropriate for your topic? Would you have any reservations about referring someone else to this page to use the information you have found?
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