EVALUATION OF WEB SITES ASSIGNMENT

THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY


Kelly Whaley and Dora George - Set Four: Drugs, Hormones & Human Tissue

 
http://csmngt.com/human_growth_hormone.htm
ACCURACY We don't believe that this site is reliable . It was very unprofessionally done, contained numerous spelling errors, and there is no editor.
AUTHORITY The author does not give his name.  He says he is a professional nurse; however, he does not provide any proof or offer any credentials.
OBJECTIVITY This site is an advertisement for human growth hormone. The site is very biased; the purpose is to get you to buy their product. There are no advertisement banners on the page.
CURRENCY The page is not dated, but by reviewing the page information, we found that it was last updated on February 21, 2001. Some of the links were recent, while others were over a year old.
COVERAGE Coverage is very one-sided because the site is advertising human growth hormone. The product can be purchased from the site.

 
http://www.webcom.com/~pinknoiz/coldwar/humantest.html
ACCURACY Because of the numerous grammar mistakes, unsited sources, and non-working links, we think this site is very unreliable.  The author seems to be biased against the government.
AUTHORITY There is no author or editor listed on the site. Since the author has posted to a generic web site we have no reason to believe that he/she has any authority on this subject whatsoever.
OBJECTIVITY The author is biased against the government because he/she thinks the government is using people as guinea pigs for testing purposes.
CURRENCY The page is not dated, but according to the page information, it was created on April 15, 2001. However, the articles on the page are from the early 1990's.
COVERAGE The author is biased and only presents one side of the argument.

 
http://www.fair.org/extra/9701/contra-crack.html
ACCURACY We believe that this is a reliable site.  It's professionally done and there are links to well known newspapers and other publications. 
AUTHORITY Norman Solomon is the author of the site, and the research assistant is Steve Rendall. The sponsor is reputable because it has the domain name .org.
OBJECTIVITY The author seems to be reporting the facts and does not reveal his opinion.  The article contains many citations from legitimate sources.
CURRENCY The article is dated January/February 1997.  The main site of fair.org is maintained regularly, with postings as recent as yesterday (June 25, 2001).
COVERAGE This site has credible information about the government's "Snow Job" on the American public.

 
SUMMARY:  We do not recommend the first two web sites for students because they are so biased and unreliable.  In the Human Growth Hormone site, the author is merely trying to sell a product. The Guinea Pigs site could be potentially dangerous for students because it links to some anti-government and militant web sites.  The Snow Job site was reliable and objective.  It had many informative links, and we would recommend it to our students.