Today I continue on from Monday’s post regarding what makes a quality Web 2.0 resource.  I’ll dig a little deeper into evaluating sources using the criteria outlined by Maureen Henninger on page 153 of her book “The Hidden Web” (2nd ed).

Maureen Henninger argues that researchers should apply the same evaluation criteria to a Web 2.0 source as they would to any website or indeed any print resources.  These criteria are:

1. authorship
2. publishing body
3. point of view or bias
4. currency
5. authenticity

The good news is that Web 2.0 has developed a culture of transparency and authenticity that actually facilitates the evaluation of sources.

1. Authorship

Web 2.0 and social networking in particular has seen a reduction in concerns about privacy online and a growth in the number of people who are willing to publish personal and professional details.  Furthermore, the blogosphere is fast becoming an alternative method for developing a professional profile compared to traditional academic publishing.  Consequently many professional blogs will be clearly marked with their author/s and often the author’s academic or business affiliations.  It is often easy to verify these credentials via other sources such as LinkedIn (a social network site for professionals where you can check references and professional connections).

2. Publishing Body

As many blogs and other Web 2.0 sources are self-published, the concept of a publishing body may appear obsolete.  In fact, with 44.4% of active internet users writing blogs (according to Universal McCann), the concept of a publisher has become more important than ever.  The role of a publisher is to identify promising authors and information, improve the quality of the content through editing and review, and then to promote and distribute the work to interested audiences.  Some blogs are supported in the traditional manner by publishers such as CCH, LexisNexis or Thomson.  But what of those who aren’t?

Some join blogging communities such as LexBlog, a blog creation service specifically for legal professionals.  But for many solo bloggers, their readership becomes their de facto publishing body.  Comments and ratings provide editing and review.  Links and reviews from other blogs provide the promotion and recommendations.  There are also blog and website aggregator services such as Digg or Technorati, which collect metrics on readership or recommendations and assign blogs and articles a quality or interest rating.  The collective readership, rather than a publisher, now defines the authority of a work.

3. Point of View/Bias

As discussed above, authenticity and transparency are highly valued in the Web 2.0 world, and it is relatively common for authors to declare their affiliations.  Those who don’t and post for ulterior motives will soon be found out by fellow bloggers and suffer a backlash of negative publicity, as was the case for Walmart’s failed PR stunt “Wal-Marting Across America”.

4. Currency

Unlike earlier static websites, blogs and wikis maintain their audience by constantly updating content.  As a consequence it is common practice to clearly mark the date of each entry or revision, making it relatively easy to assess the currency of the information.

5. Authenticity

Criticisms of Wikipedia are often met with the argument that not only is it easy to view when article was last edited, but also to access previous versions and the discussions between users that accompany revisions (David Weinberger discusses this at length in Everything is Miscellaneous).  It does require a little extra effort on the behalf of the user, but in many ways the ability to assess authenticity is just as easy with Web 2.0 sources as with traditionally published material.

So there you are.  Let no one claim that Web 2.0 sources are unreliable simply because they cannot be verified.  They CAN be verified and assessed - but it requires the reader to take the responsibility for this process.  So are readers ready to take on this responsibility?  Some might argue that it never even crosses their minds - a published book was always a trustworthy source (99% of the time anyway).  But I would argue that people are so used to being bombarded by media that they are developing automatic skills to assess what is valid and valuable - a sort of inherent cynicism.  That said, education - at the school, tertiary and professional level - will go a long way to ensuring people have the necessary information literacy skills.

54% of legal professionals in the Asia Pacific region use Web 2.0 for professional research, according to research CCH conducted last year.

You won’t find that particular figure in our original whitepaper results.  It’s part of some further analysis I did on the results for my presentation at the upcoming Australian Law Librarians Association conference.  I’ll put up a copy of the presentation and paper after the conference is finished but I thought I would give you a taste by posting some of the material I wrote that wound up on the cutting room floor.  Here goes!

54% of legal professionals in the Asia Pacific region use Web 2.0 for professional research, according to research CCH conducted last year.

What does this growing trend of legal professionals using Web 2.0 for research mean for law librarians?  There have been many papers and debates of late on the decline of legal research skills (check out these ones from the ALLA conference last year).  Is the growing reliance on Web 2.0 a symptom of the “Google researcher” problem, or is there genuine value to be drawn from this alternative source of information?

A New Jersey court of appeal case recently gained the attention of the online legal community when it reversed a judge’s decision on the basis that it relied on evidence drawn from Wikipedia.  The appeal court ruled:

“it is entirely possible for a party in litigation to alter a Wikipedia article, print the article and thereafter offer it in support of any given position.  Such a malleable source of information is inherently unreliable and clearly not one ‘whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned,’” such as would support judicial notice under New Jersey Evidence Rule 201(b)(3).”

Source: Wikipedia.org:Researching with Wikipedia

This is certainly not the only time Wikipedia has been used as a source of reference or evidence in a US or indeed in an Australian court (eg [2008] 78 IPR 41 or [2006] FMCAfam 238).  A sign of poor research skills?  Not necessarily.  A wise lawyer or judge who cites Wikipedia would only use it for general reference and definitions and/or in conjunction with supporting evidence or sources.  This is in fact what Wikipedia itself recommends .  A review of the examples cited will support this trend, whereas the New Jersey case had no other supporting source for the issue at hand.  Lawyers are aware of the dangers of citing Wikipedia: only 20% of respondents felt Wikipedia had more than moderate professional value compared to 38% of respondents overall.  So if Wikipedia is definitely not a quality Web 2.0 source, what is?

Slaw.ca is a blog that reports and analyses new developments in Canadian law and law in general.  It is a co-operative blog written by law professors, legal associates, the director of a law society, law librarians and law students.  In other words, people well qualified to provide quality professional commentary on legal developments.  In fact, Slaw is deemed to be of such high quality that the Canadian Association of Law Librarians awarded it the 2009 Hugh Lawford Award for Excellence in Legal Publishing.

Wikipedia and Slaw represent two extremes of the spectrum of information available from Web 2.0 sources.  In between lies an enormous variety of blogs, wikis, tweet streams and other sources of varying quality and currency.  Enter the librarian.  This is an opportunity for us to do what we have always done: sift through the mass of materials available and identify those that are most relevant to our clients.  More importantly, we need to educate our users on sourcing and assessing these materials for themselves.

Tomorrow I will look at Maureen Henniger’s evaluation criteria for an information source and how the transparency of Web 2.0 culture actually makes it relatively easy to assess the validity and accuracy of a source.