(1) Purpose- what is the purpose of this site or page? What does the URL say about the producer of the web site and its purpose? (2) Objectivity - does the content reflect a bias? (3) Currency- Is the information on the page u-to date? Can you tell when the page was last updated? Are there dead links within the current website? (4) Responbility- are the authors up-front about their purpose and content? Is there anyway to contact the authors, is there information located on the website page? (5) Accessibility- Are you able to get into the website easily, does the site load quickly and able to move around the site easily? (6)Authority- What are the authors credentials? These credentials be made up on the website, false information?
All inforamtion contained on a website needs to be evaluated by readers for authority, appropriateness, and other personal criteria for value. If you locate inforamtion that is just "too good to be true", than it probably is. Never use inforamtion taken off of the World Wide Web that you can not verify. The internet is a great hoax place for people.
The two websites that I chose to evaluate were:
- Rochester Electronics - http://www.rocelec.com/
- Source ESB - http://www.sourceesb.com/
Rochester Electroncs is an aweful sight if they are looking to get business from people within the web. However in my situation I have a direct contact for this company so the only navigating I do through the website is to see if they have a product, stock, pricing, etc. If I was an individual looking to purchase somethign from this company I would have a secon opinion in my purchase decision. For one the navigation bar goes horizontal and vertical, which per the book is a NO NO! When navigating through the website they do show great color repetition to keep the eye at a soft tone, but the font size and style is just too much for a reader of the website. They did not concentrate on the individuals that would be viewing the website! At the top they give you the option to sign into their website, but not the offer to new clients that would be interesting in possible becoming a frequent returner of their website. It is not very user friendly for people who do not use the world wide web for company purpose vs. individual purpose. An example is my father, he works for a contract manufacturere and if he was on this website looking for a part he would be lost on what to do and how to navigate through the websire because he only uses the internet during work hours and doesnt get much "practice". Our engineers at my work are always complaing about certain sites, since we have moves away from magazine and catalogs to everything being on the internet it is much more difficult for them, time freindly, YES!
Source ESB - In my opinion is a really great site for new and returning customers. They use the same color reptition, on colors that GRAB your eyes and keep your eyes guiding through the entire site. Thye are giving you many options on how to search for a part or manufacture. They give you option of manually typing the number in, looking it up alphabetically, or a quick (reference) look up. This gives the viewer many options as to which THEY feel comforatable navigating around the site on how they prefer; friendly to all ages. In order to be able to view the site you must create a "free" account and then this time you have your own histry, views, etc. To me
The reason that I picked these two websites is becuase these are two of the websites that I use on a daily basis at my job, and am viewing many times throughout the day. I will be much more critical now when viewing websites, especially most of my daily work is being on Outlook and the Internet! it is nice to now just look at many different sites and see what they can do it iprove the site, or if it is a "perfect" webpage. I have taken a few notes already to get my prepared when creating my own webpage.
Great evaluation of websites. I agree with your findings.
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