Finding Information in a Digital age

General Principles

• Skills used for finding information in the non-digital world are the same as those used for finding information in the digital world

• The skills which you all develop as users of libraries containing printed material will stand you in good stead

• The electronic medium involves a new technology, therefore it requires some different mechanical skill

• However, it does not require different intellectual skills• If you are deficient in using "traditional" libraries, you will be deficient in using the

web

General Principles

• The Web is not a source of information• The Web is both a repository of digital information and a tool allowing access to

traditional information • The Web is not disorganized; it is organized by hardware, remote hosts or servers,

to which you have access, and local hosts, the computers used by individuals, corporations, and governments to compile information to be placed on servers

• The contents of the Internet, including the Web, is organized by the individuals, corporations, and governments that compile the information

• The best portals only find a small fraction of the information about a particular topic on the Internet

Searching the World Wide Web

Browsing the entire web using a portal, gateway, search engine, or directory is very inefficient albeit fascinating, like browsing in a library

You should start by searching a restricted part of the web, perhaps one with which you are familiar and one in which you have a high degree of confidence of finding relevant and valuable material

You might think about using the electronic versions of the texts you usually use for completing projects

Some General Readings

Knowledge Management (Gene Bellinger)Data Mining (Kurt Thearling)A Paradigm for Understanding the Internet Navigating the World Wide Web The History of Computers and the Internet Office of Information Technology Newsletter

Research in the Electronic World

The World Wide Web contains two types of electronic information • Reference information, which will direct you to material that may or may not be

electronic • Factual information, which may or may not be accurate, timely, or relevant to your

research

One way of accessing these materials is via a portal, such as Google

A Major Research Tool For You? The World Wide WebSearch the Web more efficiently

Google

Google Guide; making searching easier Google Tutor’s Google Search ManualGoogling to the max

Encyclopedias

WikipediaThe Encyclopedia of EarthEarth PortalE-encyclopedia (Google)Encyclopedia Britannica MSN EncartaInfoplease

Encyclopedia Smithsonian

Reference Information

University of Minnesota LibrariesMinnesota Historical Society LibraryLibrary of Congress

Fresh Energy

These sites also contain factual information

How to is a valuable link

University of Minnesota Libraries

A. Sticks - texts - books, journals, and maps B. Clicks - electronic databases Indexes collections of databases, including journals, statistics, and images• JStor• LexisNexis Academic• GPO AccessE-journals – the full text articles which may or may not also appear in print• Government Information Quarterly• Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers• Annals of the Association of American GeographersStatistics • LexisNexis Statistical

University of Minnesota Libraries

E. Images• Minnesota Digital Library

Links to other libraries

• Law Library • Government Document Library • Business Reference Library • John R. Borchert Map Library • Forestry Library • University Archives

University of Minnesota Libraries Resources

Finding Books

Finding Journal Articles

• Electronic Databases: Indexes • Electronic Journals

Finding Web Sites

Finding Business Sources

An Alternative Strategy

You can start at the home page of a particular institution or a particular organization but a far more efficient way of searching is to use a search engine specific to a group of institutions or organizations

University of Michigan Documents Center

Federal GovernmentMinnesotaDakota CountyMinneapolis Nature Conservancy (nonprofit)Xcel Energy

Be wary of sites created by individuals, even a group of individuals with no “controls” on the content

Rod’s page

A good place to start might be the sources from which you get your usual information – the mind boggles

Star TribuneWall Street JournalElectronic versions of journals – Time, Newsweek Minnesota Public RadioNBCWCCO

Lexis-Nexis

Legal publishing arm of Reed Elsevier plc, an Anglo-Dutch firmIncludes Butterworths and Martindale-Hubbell

Lexis-Nexis AcademicLexis-Nexis CongressionalLexis-Nexis Government PeriodicalsLexis-Nexis Statistical

Electronic Journal Collection at UMN

Blackwell's Synergy (Blackwell Publishing) Cambridge University Press Journals Ecological Society of America Environment and Planning Harper's Weekly Hein Online Ingenta Interscience (Wiley) JStor

Kluwer Online National Journal Titles Nature Oxford University Press Science ScienceDirect including Academic Press (Elsevier) Scientific American Archives Society of American Foresters University of Chicago Press

Law Sites

LLRX.com metalinks

HeinOnline. The Modern Link to Legal History

Evaluating Internet Resources

Evaluating Web Pages (University of California, Berkeley)Evaluating Information Sources (University of Minnesota)

Do not forget, virtually anyone can place material on the Web One way to evaluate information found on the Web is to consider the source of the

informationDomain names then become an important characteristic One type of information is information that has already been published in a different

mediumSuch information may have already gone through some sort of peer review Under this category come the journal articles that can be found in libraries and online These material are usually outdated and will not be updated

Questions to ask

Who created the site? What organization? When was the site created? What was the last update? How well can you identify who wrote the site material? What credentials does the author of the site material offer you to justify his/her

authority? Are references given? Are links given? How long and with what kind of continuity has the site been maintained? Does the material on the site take into account other perspectives?

Citing sources

All references in the text should be made by using endnotesElectronically Published Information • Source or author • URL - the electronic location• Date last updated • Date visited Text Publications - choose a style and stick with it • The Chicago Manual of Style Online• Style Manuals and Citation Guides (University of Minnesota)If the electronic information is a digital version of a written publication • then give a reference to the written publication • only give a reference to the url if it is stable

Web Research

1. You must cite the source of all the information you use from the Web2. You must cite two dates, first, the date you visited a particular URL to get the

information and second, the date the page was last updated3. You may use the material on the Web but you may not merely download an entire

page, or even a screen, from a particular URL and hand it in as part of your project 4. You must download the material to a word processing package and edit the

material, getting rid of the extraneous material and italicizing the cited text

There are several exceptions to this general rule • A map can be handed in with data superfluous to the map removed – with scissors! • A table can be handed in similarly edited. • A complete paper that you wish to include in its entirety as an appendix can also be

handed in. This last category should be used sparingly

Web Portals

University of Minnesota Libraries• LexisNexis Congressional• LexisNexis Academic• JStor

Federal Government Portals• FirstGov.gov• GPOAccess• FedLaw

Legal Information Institute (Cornell University)Minnesota North Star

Wilderness Research

FirstGov.org <wilderness act> 21,667 <wilderness> 43,535

Google <wilderness> 34,400,000 English pages

University of Minnesota Libraries <wilderness> 4687 records

LexisNexis Academic <wilderness act> 450 law review articles <wilderness> >1,000

JStor <wilderness> 30,453 articles

Congressional Quarterly

ProductsPublic Affairs Collection OnlineCQ Weekly Online The CQ researcherGuide to Congress How Congress worksGuide to the U.S. Supreme Court How to access the federal government on the Internet State and local governmentCongress and the nation