The Internet provides access to millions of websites about any given topic. For this reason, it is important to be able to pick out the quality websites. Critical analysis can assist you in minimizing the time you spend looking for authoritative resources, and this guide has been created to assist you in this endeavor.

The first thing you can do to limit the time you spend searching for quality results is to find a trusted website where someone else has already done the “leg work” of evaluating websites. This type of website is known as an Internet Portal. Below are examples of such portals where such critical analysis has been done:

1. LCCC Databases and Websites by Subject (http://depts.luzerne.edu/library/subjects.shtml) – Subjects related to LCCC curriculum

2. Internet Public Library (http://www.ipl.org/) – Most subjects

3. Voice of the Shuttle (http://vos.ucsb.edu/) – Mainly humanities and social sciences

4. INTUTE (http://www.intute.ac.uk/) – Most academic subjects

If portals like these are not providing the websites you are seeking, you can always use Internet search engines to retrieve large numbers of links on any given topic. Examples of search engines include but are not limited to: Google (http://www.google.com/); dogpile (http://www.dogpile.com/); and Ask.com (http://www.ask.com/).

NOTE: When retrieving result from search engines, it is important to keep in mind that very little critical analysis has been done in terms of the results obtained. Search engines merely retrieve websites that have the appropriate HTML tags (as determined by the person or entity that created the website), and these tags may have very little to do with the actual content of the website. For further information on search engines and how they operate visit the website Search Engine Showdown (http://www.searchengineshowdown.com/).

Below are some “rules of thumb” which you can use to evaluate websites. While these rules do not apply in all case, they can be considered general guidelines.

Internet Domains:
1. Look at the domain of the URL. In English, this means look at the type of website with which you are dealing. For example, the domain of the URL http://plato.stanford.edu is .edu and this means that the website comes from an educational institution. These types of websites are generally considered to be fairly reliable sources for authoritative information. Still, .edu websites can have personal pages attached to them that may or may not be authoritative. To determine whether a .edu website is authoritative, other critical tools come into play. In terms of other domains, .gov (government) websites are generally thought to be similar in quality to .edu websites (but again not always).

2. Two types of websites that are somewhat authoritative are .net (network associations) and .org (usually non-profit organizations) websites. Users are cautioned to look for organizational biases, however.

3. Probably the most common type of website domain is the .com website. These websites usually exist for commercial purposes, and are most likely trying to sell you something. Thus, information found on .com websites should be critically analyzed before it is considered to be authoritative.

Some other aspects of websites that could be used for evaluative purposes:
1. Age of the Webpage – When was the website last updated? This is where knowledge of the subject about which you are seeking information comes in handy. For example, if you are doing research on ancient Greek philosophy, a 5-year old website might not be troublesome. There might have been some new research on the primary sources since the date on the website, but chances are very good that the authors of the ancient texts, being dead for more than 2,000 years, have not written anything new in the last five years. With a website on information technology, however, a 5-year old website would be considered irrelevant to current trends in the field.

2. Authorship – Will anyone claim credit for the website? If there is no author available, the authority of the webpage could be suspect. This is not to say that a good point might not be present on such a website. It does, however, indicate that support for the good point will usually be needed from other, clearly attributed sources.

3. Language and Style – Is the language on the website blatantly biased? How many spelling errors (or curse words) are in the text? Are points well-presented? DOES THE AUTHOR OF THE WEBSITE USE ALL CAPITAL LETTERS? While negative answers to these questions do not automatically disqualify a source from being authoritative, additional critical analysis might be required to determine if this is the case.

4. Design – How professional does the webpage look? Is the webpage or website easy to use? Is information easy to find on the website? Again, bad website design does not automatically mean that the information provided on that website is flawed. It does indicate that the web designer might not feel that the mode in which the information is received is important. This leads to the question of whether the designer has equal disregard for the truth of the information presented.

5. Sources – Does the website provide any evidence to back up the claims made? Is there any independent way to verify the claims made on the website? A bibliography or list of sources independent of the website creator can go a long way toward establishing credibility as can the listing of possible biases or conflicts of interest. Making bold claims and not backing them up beyond what is presented should automatically raise a warning flag. This is not to say that it is impossible for the specific claims on those types of websites to be true, but additional support should be required before users accept such claims as being authoritative.

6. Logic – Are there any blatant fallacies presented? If there are blatant fallacies (or falsehoods) present, users need to take a critical look at the information/conclusions present on the whole website. While the presence of fallacies does not necessarily mean that all the information on a website is bad, it is at least circumstantial support for the idea that the website in question might not contain authoritative information, and that the user should look elsewhere.

7. Original Intent of the Website – What was the website originally intended to do or be? One example that is troublesome in terms of authority is Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org). The problem is that all entries are editable by any user – literally anyone can contribute information for any topic regardless of whether they are expert on that topic. This website might be a decent place to start an academic search. Users would be well-advised, however, to seek other sources, citing those sources instead of using the Wikipedia entry that helped the user start the search for information.

For additional links to websites with information about evaluating websites, please see the Evaluating Websites section of the Help page of the LCCC Library website (http://depts.luzerne.edu/library/askalibrarian.shtml).