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Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to revisit Google Scholar. Design/methodology/approach - This paper discusses the strengths and weaknesses of Google Scholar. Findings - The Google Books project has given a massive and valuable boost to the already rich and diverse content of Google Scholar. The dark side of the growth is that significant gaps remain for top ranking journals and serials, and the number of duplicate, triplicate and quadruplicate records for the same source documents (which Google Scholar cannot detect reliably) has increased. Originality/value - This paper discusses the strengths and weaknesses of Google Scholar. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to assess the relative opacity of the “About” page at PubPeer, which is a whistleblower website, primarily of the academic literature. The site refers to itself as an online journal club. It is important to assess whether the PubPeer site, organization or leadership display opacity because PubPeer attempts to hold the authors who have published errors in their literature to the high standards of transparency.Design/methodology/approach The paper examined the statements of the “About” page at PubPeer to assess the aspects of opacity. The “About” page is the face and image of an organization to the public.Findings In 2015, The PubPeer Foundation was created as a charitable organization to receive funding in the USA, and at the end of 2016, the PubPeer Foundation received funding (US$ 412,000) from a philanthropic organization, the Laura and John Arnold Foundation. Several of these details were not indicated in the older version of the “About” page at PubPeer. Other aspects of that page are opaque.Research limitations/implications To fully assess the opacity of PubPeer, continual monitoring is needed. The examination of the “About” page gives a limited perspective.Practical implications Academics are under intense scrutiny by a vigilant anonymous and pseudonymous community at PubPeer. Any opacity by PubPeer, as was documented here, reduces trust in its objectives and operations. Reduced trust is at the heart of the replication crisis.Originality/value This paper represents the first published critical assessment of PubPeer. Science watchdogs, which watch various science-related organizations, also need to be watched. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The use of recommender systems is increasing on academic social media (ASM). However, distinguishing the elements that may be influenced and/or exert influence over content that is read and disseminated by researchers is difficult due to the opacity of the algorithms that filter information on ASM. In this article, the purpose of this paper is to investigate how algorithmic mediation through recommender systems in ResearchGate may uphold biases in scholarly communication. Design/methodology/approach: The authors used a multi-method walkthrough approach including a patent analysis, an interface analysis and an inspection of the web page code. Findings: The findings reveal how audience influences on the recommendations and demonstrate in practice the mutual shaping of the different elements interplaying within the platform (artefact, practices and arrangements). The authors show evidence of the mechanisms of selection, prioritization, datafication and profiling. The authors also substantiate how the algorithm reinforces the reputation of eminent researchers (a phenomenon called the Matthew effect). As part of defining a future agenda, we discuss the need for serendipity and algorithmic transparency. Research limitations/implications: Algorithms change constantly and are protected by commercial secrecy. Hence, this study was limited to the information that was accessible within a particular period. At the time of publication, the platform, its logic and its effects on the interface may have changed. Future studies might investigate other ASM using the same approach to distinguish potential patterns among platforms. Originality/value: Contributes to reflect on algorithmic mediation and biases in scholarly communication potentially afforded by recommender algorithms. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first empirical study on automated mediation and biases in ASM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Websites have their own features in aspect preference (e.g. the relative importance platforms place on product aspects in product evaluation). The purpose of this paper is to capture characteristics of different book reviews on aspect preferences by opinion mining techniques. Design/methodology/approach: The authors employ two indicators for identifying aspect preferences, and propose a method for quantifying overall differences of reviews on aspect preferences through three dimensions: aspect awareness, aspect satisfaction and comprehensive value. Findings: The results show that book reviews on e-commerce websites contain information about external aspects of a book (e.g. hardcover), while those on social network websites pay more attention to content-related aspects of the book (e.g. stories). These results indicate that aspect preferences of reviews vary from platforms and make it hard to evaluate book comprehensively based on single-source data. Online book reviews from a wide range of sources can assess book impact from multiple perspectives and dimensions. Practical implications: In order to illustrate the value of the authors' method, the authors show book impact assessment based on multi-source data as an application of these difference analyses. Furthermore, the authors present an example of a book promotion to provide customized marketing services for different user clusters. Originality/value: This study investigates the influence of different data sources on book evaluation from the content of book reviews. The authors also showcase potential applications of these analyses in book impact assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the type of personalisation services satisfying the needs of cancer websites’ target users, and the influence of their emotional states on website usage intentions.Design/methodology/approach Three data collection methods were employed. Survey questionnaires were distributed to online health users. Interviews with representatives of the cancer-affected population further explored emotions as stimuli for online cancer-related activities. Finally, availability of personalisation features was evaluated on existing health websites in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the UK.Findings A clear preference emerged for personalisation on cancer-related websites. There are specific personalisation features the cancer-affected population desires. Interestingly, certain emotions were found to stimulate visits to health websites.Research limitations/implications Fighting cancer implies constant support, including from cancer-related websites. It is thus vital to understand the required personalisation, stemming from target users’ actual needs, including the neglected user characteristics, as are emotions for cancer-affected people. This supports emotion-based personalisation.Originality/value The paper focusses on the cancer-affected population, and developing a comprehensive understanding of their personalisation needs in online health services. It further shows which emotions influence intentions to use cancer websites. The three concepts combined have not yet been studied, to the best of the authors’ knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to identify the antecedent factors – perceived usefulness (PU), perceived switching cost (PSC) and perceived web security (PWS) – affecting learners’ attitude toward online lecture website (ATW), which, in turn, affects electronic word of mouth (eWOM) and finds the factor that online lecture business should focus on the most to make learners have positive attitude.Design/methodology/approach This paper investigates the functional relationship among those five constructs; and examines the moderating role of personal interactivity. Data were collected from learners who had taken online lectures and were using social network sites, and a research model was analyzed using structural equation modeling.Findings The results show that PU and PSC positively influence ATW but PWS has no significant influence on ATW; PU is the most influential factor to ATW; ATW positively influences eWOM; personal interactivity has a moderating effect on some paths; and path coefficients are higher in the high-interactivity group than the low-interactivity group for all the links except the link from PU to ATW.Originality/value This paper contributes to online lecture business by understanding learners’ perception and behavior to the websites. Unlike many previous studies, this study designates eWOM as dependent variable and personal interactivity as moderation variable. This study shows interesting results occurred between low- and high-interactivity groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study concerning savvy searching on the advantages and disadvantages of computing h-index using Web of Science (WoS). It tries to examine the content and software advantages and disadvantages of WoS from the perspective of calculating the h-index as a single measure of published research output and influence at the individual researcher level. It finds similarities and differences between WoS and Scopus in which WoS edition has an important and unique feature as opposed to other cited reference enhanced databases.

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to engage in a thought experiment, exploring the use of Wikipedia or similar content-malleable systems for the review and dissemination of academic knowledge. Design/methodology/approach - By looking at other sources, the paper considers the current state of the academic peer-review process, discusses Wikipedia and reflects on dynamic content creation and management applications currently in use in academia. Findings - The traditional peer review process must be updated to match the rapid creation and diffusion of knowledge that characterises the 21st century. The Wikipedia concept is a potential model for more rapid and reliable dissemination of scholarly knowledge. The implications of such a concept would have a dramatic effect on the academic community. Originality/value - This paper promotes a radical idea for changing the methods by which academic knowledge is both constructed and disseminated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose ? The purpose of this paper is to clarify some issues regarding citation indexing, analysis and searching. Design/methodology/approach ? The paper begins with a discussion on an article in the D-Lib Magazine and then focuses on deflated citation counts and inflated and phantom citation counts. Findings ? The combination of the inflated citation count values dispensed by Google Scholar (GS) with the ignorance and shallowness of some GS enthusiasts can be a real mix for real scholars. Originality/value ? The paper offers insight into deflated, inflated and phantom citation counts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose With the expansion of internet as a tool for exchanging information, companies include in their websites a virtual space to share information among users. The purpose of this paper is to explore the characteristics of consumers’ reviews (electronic word-of-mouth quantity, credibility and quality) as antecedents of customers’ online repurchase intentions. Specially, it proposes a model where trust on an online seller and perceived usefulness of a website mediate the influence of electronic word-of-mouth (EWOM) characteristics on repurchase intentions.Design/methodology/approach Structural equation modeling was employed on a sample of 252 online customers. An online questionnaire was aimed at internet users who had previously made an online purchase and read online reviews received from the vendor’s website.Findings Results show that only EWOM quality has a positive direct effect on consumers’ repurchase intention while quantity has a negative influence. Perceived usefulness mediates the influence of all EWOM characteristics on online repurchase intention. EWOM credibility and quality also indirectly influence repurchase intentions through trust on the online vendor.Practical implications This paper outlines ways to improve managerial implications by developing mobile applications or websites where the reviews have an appropriate volume and quality of information. Moreover, it suggests general advice to present online reviews in a useful manner to users who visit these websites.Originality/value This study is one of the first to propose an integrative model that studies in depth the three main EWOM characteristics and customer responses for understanding their repurchase behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – This paper aims to propose a high-level structure for a global quality evaluation of a website. This structure is based on the characteristics, sub-characteristics and attributes of three main dimensions (content, service, and technical quality) that will substantiate the development of broad website quality evaluation, comparison and improvement methodologies, according to particular sectors of activity and evaluator's perspective. Design/methodology/approach – Based on the literature and the author's experience a framework is proposed for a global quality evaluation of a website. Findings – Considering the results of some studies, as well as the systematisation of the knowledge available in several bibliographies, website quality can be grouped into three main dimensions: content quality, service quality, and technical quality. There has not yet been an evaluation methodology that focuses on these three main website quality dimensions in a broad and transversal sense. Originality/value – The paper presents an innovative high-level structure for a global quality evaluation of a website, based on three dimensions not previously considered together. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which Web 2.0 applications are prevalent in government web sites, the ways in which Web 2.0 applications have been used in government web sites, as well as whether the presence of Web 2.0 applications correlates with the perceived quality of government web sites. Design/methodology/approach – Divided equally between developing and advanced economies, a total of 200 government web sites were analysed using content analysis and multiple regression analysis. Findings – The prevalence of seven Web 2.0 applications in descending order was: RSS, multimedia sharing services, blogs, forums, social tagging services, social networking services and wikis. More web sites in advanced countries include Web 2.0 applications than those in developing countries. The presence of Web 2.0 applications was found to have a correlation with the overall web site quality, and in particular, service quality. Research limitations/implications – This paper only covers government web sites in English. Emerging genres of Web 2.0 applications such as mashups and virtual worlds have not been included. Moreover the data were drawn solely from the public domain. Practical implications – Decision makers and e-government web developers may benchmark their own efforts in deploying Web 2.0 applications against this study. The numerous exemplars cited here serve as a springboard to generate more ideas on how Web 2.0 applications could be used and harnessed to improve the overall quality of government web sites. Originality/value – This paper unites two research interests: Web 2.0 and web site quality. It also extends previous studies by investigating the suite of Web 2.0 applications found in government web sites around the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - One of the relevance feedback techniques used in search engines is providing a link to similar documents for each retrieved document in a results page. The purpose of this paper is to assess whether the "similar pages" relevance feedback feature of Google is truly effective in retrieving documents relevant to the information needs of users. Design/methodology/approach - The effectiveness of the "similar pages" feature of Google was investigated using 30 paired searches conducted by 30 users with real information needs. The precision ratio of the results of the initial searches and of the searches conducted by clicking the "similar pages" links of the four most relevant results of each initial search were compared. The time spent and the overlapped results of the two kinds of searches were also compared. Findings - The mean values for precision of and time spent on the "similar pages" searches were significantly less than those for the initial searches. Although, the number of overlapping documents in the "similar pages" searches was higher than that for the initial searches, the difference was not statistically significant. Practical implications - The findings of this research would be useful for search engine designers as well as the numerous users of common search engines, especially Google, to decide if "similar pages" features truly enhance the quality of information retrieval on the web. Originality/value - The experimental evidence provided in this paper relates to system design of information retrieval systems on the web. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - A growing amount of information available on the web can be classified as contextual information, putting already existing information into a new context rather than creating isolated new information resources. Blogs are a typical and popular example of this category. By looking at blogs from a more context-oriented view, it is possible to deconstruct them into structures which are more contextual than just focused on the content, facilitating flexible reuse of these structures: that is the aim of this paper. Design/methodology/approach - The paper looks at the underlying structures of blogs and blog posts, representing them as multi-ended links. This alternative representation of blogs and blog posts allows us to represent them as reusable information structures. This paper presents blogs as a popular content type, but the approach of restructuring Web 2.0 content can be extended to other classes of information, as long as they can be regarded as being mainly contextual. Findings - By deconstructing blogs and blog posts into their essential properties, it can be shown how there is a simple and universal representation for blogs. This representation allows the reuse of blog information across specific blog or blogging platforms, and can even go beyond blogs by representing other web content which provides context. Originality/value - This paper presents a novel approach for mapping a popular web content type to a simple and universal representation. The value of such a unified representation lies in exposing the structural similarities among blogs and blog posts, and making them available for reuse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - This paper seeks to look at the question of accuracy of content regarding Wikipedia and other internet encyclopædias. Design/methodology/approach - By looking at other sources, the paper considers whether the information contained within Wikipedia can be relied on to be accurate. Findings - Wikipedia poses as an encyclopædia when by no stretch of the definition can it be termed such; therefore, it should be subject to regulation. Originality/value - The paper highlights the issue that, without regulation, content cannot be relied on to be accurate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the amount of online information reported by Spanish municipal-owned enterprises (MOEs) according to the legal requirements indicated in the Spanish Law 19/2013 on Transparency and Good Governance. In addition, the authors analyze how different variables can affect the extent of online information reported by such enterprises. Design/methodology/approach: To do this, we conducted a content analysis of the web pages of Spanish MOEs located in cities with more than 100.000 habitants, as well as those cities that are provincial capitals. To find information about these enterprises, the authors accessed the General Intervention Board of the State Administration (IGAE) webpage (www.igae.pap.minhafp.gob.es/sitios/igae/es-ES/Paginas/inicio.aspx). This sample was composed of 273 enterprises majority owned and controlled by local governments. Findings: The findings reveal that the amount of information reported by Spanish MOEs, in accordance with the legal requirements, is quite reduced. The most influential variables for explaining Spanish MOEs' commitment to information disclosure are population size, political positioning of the local government and reputation. Originality/value: This study seeks to contribute to the scarce literature on mandatory transparency in the public sector as well as to reinforce the degree of compliance with requirements of information disclosure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyse if citizens' searches on the internet coincide with the services that municipal websites offer. In addition, the authors examine municipal webpage rankings in search engines and the factors explaining them.Design/methodology/approach The empirical study, conducted through a sample of Spanish city councils, contrasted if the information that can be found on a municipal website fits with citizens' demands. This has been done by comparing the most-searched keywords with the contents of municipal websites.Findings A positive relationship between the supply and demand of municipal information on the internet has been found, but much can still be improved. Analysed administrations rank the basic data of the organisation, as well as some of the fundamental competences thereof, at the top in search engines, but the results are not entirely effective with some keywords still highly demanded by citizens, such as those related to employment or tourism. Factors explaining internet ranking include the number of pages of the municipal website, its presence in social networks and an indicator designed to measure the difficulty of ranking the municipal place-name.Originality/value The results obtained from this study provide valuable information for municipal managers. Municipal websites should not only include information in which citizens are interested, but achieve accessibility standards, have a responsive web design, and follow the rules of web usability. Additionally, they should be findable, which also requires improvement in terms of the design of the municipal website thinking in search engines, particularly in terms of certain technical characteristics that improve findability. A municipal website that wants to have a good positioning should increase its contents and attain the maximum degree possible of visibility in social networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- The purpose of this paper is to explore the determinants of online corporate reporting in three Latin American emerging markets, Argentina, Mexico and Chile, providing further evidence to test the mediation role of web presence development in the relationship between these determinants and e-disclosure. Web presence development measures the firm's efforts to archive web visibility, web usability and convenience. Design/methodology/approach -- Based on a content analysis of corporate web sites, the extent of the information is measured by three internet disclosure indexes. Four constructs which are considered key drivers of a firm's disclosure strategy are identified. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to assess the research model. The sample contains publicly available data on listed companies' web sites. Findings -- The results reveal that the development of a firm's presence on the internet is as important as its characteristics in determining corporate transparency and in mediating the relationship between firm size and cross-listing and e-disclosure. Practical implications -- Companies should be aware that investors are attaching increasing importance to corporate transparency. Consequently, managers should put more effort into improving web sites, which would increase corporate visibility and open up a direct communication channel with their stakeholders. They should also take advantage of web sites to provide information, above and beyond that required by local law. Not only do current and potential investors find this useful, it also increases their confidence in the company. Originality/value -- This paper proposes an integrative model of the determinants of the level of online corporate reporting using constructs that reflect their multidimensional nature. A non-financial latent variable for web presence on the internet is proposed as a mediator in the relationship between e-disclosure and traditional determinants. The SEM approach simultaneously examines the direct and indirect relationships between the proposed latent variables and how these relationships influence the level of e-disclosure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to identify the level of disclosure about mobile banking (MB) on bank websites.Design/methodology/approach The study sample comprises Brazilian and American banks, and the authors employed both quantitative and qualitative approaches to analyze the data. An index of 14 items was used to measure levels of disclosure. The quantitative stage involved descriptive analysis of disclosure levels, which was associated with other variables through the application of multivariate regression analysis. The qualitative stage involved a content analysis technique.Findings The statistical analysis indicated that size and country were significant explanatory variables for the level of information disclosed on bank websites. American banks disclosed more information about MB on their websites than Brazilian banks.Originality/value In the approach, using elements of voluntary disclosure theories, the authors expect to provide insights on how to increase MB information for potential users through a low-cost mechanism, web-based disclosure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to report the results of an experimental study designed to better understand the role of online product reviews, both valence and volume, in the formation of initial online trust during a consumer’s exploratory stage with an e-tailer. This is done within the context of simultaneously varying e-tailer reputation and product type.Design/methodology/approach Participants take part in a conjoint task that involves viewing fictitious web pages and indicating their level of trust in using the site to purchase the product displayed. The web pages are developed by manipulating four attributes (e-tailer reputation, product type, summary product star rating and number of online reviews) according to a full factorial design. Conjoint models are estimated to determine the relative influence of each attribute on trust perceptions, the significance of selected two-way interactions among the four attributes, and potential moderating effects of varied prior online experiences, including previous usage frequency of online reviews.Findings Results reveal that e-tailer reputation has the greatest impact on initial trust perceptions, followed by the summary review star rating of the product. Significant two-way interactions show that a large number of reviews enhance the effect of a positive summary review on trust while shopping for high priced experience products diminishes the positive influence of e-tailer reputation. Prior online experiences moderate the relationship between these website attributes and perceived trust by interacting with the two strongest trust cues in the model. The effects of these attributes on trust perceptions are less for those with higher levels of prior online experiences.Originality/value The study uses conjoint analysis, which requires participants to implicitly “tradeoff” among website attributes in making overall judgments about e-tailer trustworthiness. Consequently, the relative influence of online reviews (both valence and volume) on initial trust perceptions is derived empirically in a realistic setting that involves online shopping contexts with different risk (by varying product type). Moreover, the authors are able to estimate interaction effects. A significant interaction between summary product star rating and number of reviews implies that online review volume may be more important to perceived e-tailer trustworthiness than earlier studies suggest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose Social commerce websites entail a completely new scenario for sharing experiences and opinions due to its richness in terms of social interactions. Nowadays, users can interact with the company and with other users; hence, it seems important to study how social stimuli affect users. Drawing on the stimulus-organism-response framework and flow theory, the purpose of this paper is to propose that the social stimulus (named social passion (sPassion)) has a positive effect on the organism (state of flow), which leads to a users’ positive response (via social word of mouth (sWOM)).Design/methodology/approach The data were collected through an online survey in 2015. The sample consists of 771 users of social commerce websites, of which 51 percent are male and 49 percent female, aged between 16 and 80 years old. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data with the statistical software SPSS version 22 and EQS 6.Findings The empirical results confirm that passionate users are prone to experience a state of flow and, as a consequence, share positive sWOM.Originality/value This study contributes to the literature on customers’ online participation, and the findings are hoped to help companies in developing social commerce websites that boost users’ exchange of information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of the presence and type of product symbol on online users' information search behaviour. Adopting an information processing perspective, it gathers objective and self-reported measures and investigates the relationships between them. Design/methodology/approach – An experiment was conducted with a sample of 174 individuals. The presence of a symbol recommending the product or signalling its popularity within the website was manipulated. Participants' need for cognition was measured. Findings – The presence of a product symbol positively influenced users' cognitive elaboration and perceptions of information diagnosticity. Significant differences of situational and individual characteristics, related to the type of symbol and the users' motivation to process information, were detected. Research limitations/implications – Dual information processing theories represent an adequate framework to analyse the ways in which online users perceive and process product symbols, and how they incorporate them into their diagnosticity perceptions. The presence and type of product symbols operate through different mechanisms depending on the user's need for cognition. Web designers should consider displaying these cues in online product presentations, given their potential to improve the quality of consumers' thoughts and diagnosticity perceptions. Originality/value – This is one of the first studies which examines how product symbols affect online users' information processing and evaluations. The paper offers a complete view of online information search behaviour by gathering users' objective and self-reported measures. In addition the paper stresses the importance of contextual variables related to the messages and individual's characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The aim of this paper is to analyse the extent to which global financial institutions are using Web 2.0 technologies and social media initiatives to transform the way in which they perform their corporate disclosure, that is, if these entities are opening a real corporate dialogue. Design/methodology/approach - The web sites of 132 major global financial entities - in Europe (54 entities), the Asia-Pacific region (55) and the Americas (23) - have been scored according to a Sophistication Index, considering various relevant Web 2.0 technologies and social media implementations. The analysis, by means of least squares and logistic regression models, is consistent across both techniques. Findings - Web 2.0 technologies and social media are not fully available in the corporate reporting arena. Nonetheless, a significant influence is detected. The size of each entity and the region in which it operates influence the scored utilisation of Web 2.0 and social media initiatives. Research limitation/implications - Web 2.0 tools and social media initiatives have been researched via corporate web sites. Corporate visibility in the major social networks, and also the use of advanced web metrics, will remain topics for further research. Practical implications - A lack of strategy for implementing an effective corporate dialogue is clearly observed. Based on these findings the banking industry and the supervisory authorities, which are under special scrutiny due to the recent global crisis, can take much greater advantage of the potential of social media to open a real corporate dialogue, increasing the level of transparency. Originality/value - As social media are becoming more useful and ubiquitous, both academics and practitioners need some initial and reliable background data on this preliminary situation. The extraordinary role of protagonist that the banking industry has played in the recent economic upheavals justify its selection as a first sample for this exploratory study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - This paper aims to present research on how and why microfinance institutions (MFIs) disclose financial and social information on the internet. Legitimacy theory provides the theoretical framework. Design/methodology/approach - The empirical study analysed factors influencing MFIs to publish financial and social information on the internet. The model was tested using regression analysis. The sample consisted of publicly available data from the web sites of 273 MFIs. Findings - The study found that MFIs' internet presence overall is scarce and that greater levels of disclosure are needed. It was found that large MFIs with a high degree of public exposure on the internet disclose greater amounts of information on their web sites than smaller MFIs with a low degree of public exposure. It was also found that for-profit MFIs disclose more financial information on their web sites, while non-profit non-governmental organisations (NGOs) reveal more social information. Practical implications - MFIs should be proud to tell the world what they are doing. MFI managers need to remember that transparency increases funds from donors. Donors are mostly based in developed countries, so the internet plays a key role in disclosure and attracting potential donors. Thus, managers of MFIs are encouraged to increase disclosure levels - especially on the internet. Originality/value - Academic research into the factors that influence MFIs' internet disclosure is still scarce. This is an important area of study because full disclosure offers enormous benefits. Since MFIs have a social mission, they are legitimated in the eyes of their donors by disclosing social information. Since they are also financial institutions, they have to show that they use the funds they receive efficiently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - This article aims to understand the opportunities as well as the challenges posed by the methods for internationalized access to domain names. Design/methodology/approach - The paper first provides background information on how domain names are resolved in the domain name system (DNS). It then reviews the various methods for internationalized access to domain names with a focus on their technical implementation and potential problems. Finally, it discusses several important language and policy issues surrounding the methods. Findings - The methods proposed for internationalized access to domain names can be classified into two groups: ASCII-compatible encoding; and multilingual keywords. ASCII-compatible encoding methods, such as the internationalized domain name (IDN) standards specified by the internet engineering task force, seem technically sound since they do not affect existing DNS operations, but they have some structural limitations. Multilingual keyword methods are rather simple and intuitive to use but they are not compatible with one another and so may return different results from the same multilingual keyword query. Also, both ASCII-compatible encoding and multilingual keyword methods can raise some important issues associated with languages and policies, such as linguistic problems, disputes over IDNs, and multilingual homographs. Originality/value - The issues discussed in this paper need to be addressed for broad and seamless implementation of the methods for internationalized access to domain names across various languages. The review of the methods and associated issues can prove helpful to those from internet users and domain name registrants to domain name registries and registrars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose ? An issue of increased interest in metadata research concerns finding ways to store, in the metadata of an information resource, data regarding the resource's quality. The purpose of this paper is to present a metadata schema that facilitates representation and storage of data related to the quality of an e-commerce resource, the e-commerce evaluation metadata (ECEM) schema. Design/methodology/approach ? A study of quality approaches that can be applied for the evaluation of e-commerce resources is provided. The ECEM schema structure and elements are described. To demonstrate how ECEM can be used, two indicative examples are given: describing an e-commerce quality approach, and storing quality evaluation results. A discussion about the validation and implementation of ECEM is also provided. Findings ? It has been demonstrated that ECEM can be effectively used to describe e-commerce quality approaches. ECEM also facilitates the structured representation and storage of quality evaluation results. It is recommended that ECEM metadata be encoded using the eXtensible markup language (XML); thus, a corresponding XML schema has been produced. Originality/value ? Metadata about resources' quality has been developed ad hoc, according to the needs of each particular application domain, and cannot be applied in other contexts. E-commerce is one application domain where no such contributions currently exist. ECEM is a step towards the reusable and interoperable storage of quality information in metadata. It is expected to facilitate a large number of potential applications, such as quality-oriented search of e-commerce resources and reusable storage of evaluation results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The traditional means of procuring airline tickets and associate travel arrangements are rapidly changing. The advent and proliferation of computers, coupled with the increasingly acceptable leveraging of the Internet has caused some major changes in the travel industry. These changes are primarily being facilitated by Internet travel marketplaces (such as Expedia, Orbitz, and Travelvelocity) that claim to provide an easier, less expensive alternative to traditional methods of ticket procurement without sacrificing service quality. If travel marketplaces are to be successful then they need to understand their customers and what the motivations behind their actions when it comes to shopping for discount travel. However, there are required information exchanges on the part of both the service provider and the consumer that are not without perceived risks and required a sense of mutual trust. This paper looked at online consumer behavior as it pertains to e-travel through the theoretical perspectives of expectancy theory and the technical acceptance model by inspecting selected motives and experiences of the consumer and specifically what these Web sites offer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital information retrieval has been as a problem, and at the same time a research interest for information scientists in recent years. They have planned some solutions to solve problems manifested during the 1990s. Designing meta-tags and applying them to HTML documents was a remedy in this direction. Meta-tags can help authors, publishers and indexers of Web pages to analyze intended content more precisely and efficiently. The aim of the present survey is to measure meta-tags of the Iranian Web sites in accordance with an international criterion. To carry out the research, 346 Iranian Web sites were selected among 3,342, which represented a sample of all Web sites existed in Iranhoo, an Iranian Web directory. The source codes of the sample home pages were reviewed in terms of the presence of keywords and description meta-tags. The findings of the survey showed that 31.5 percent and 24.6 percent of the Iranian Web sites have keywords and description meta-tags respectively. The paper concludes that the Iranian Web sites are lower than non-Iranian Web sites in terms of the use of meta-tags. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Web usage statistics are often used as a tool for assessing a Web site, despite some of their drawbacks. This paper attempts to evaluate a government publications library Web site by studying its usage statistics. It examines organization, including access, searchability, and structure, of electronic government information in subject directory format. This study reveals that a subject directory Web site is an important tool for distributing electronic government information, but it requires continuous development. The usage statistics are useful in monitoring search engine ranking, improving display, structure, and searchability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the role of intelligent agents in facilitating the seeking and retrieval of information in Web-based library environments. An overview is presented on agents and their current application in library domains to produce a generic agent-based model for libraries to follow. The model suggests that Web-based information seeking and retrieval in library contexts could be enhanced through a collaborating network of interface and information agents. Recent research results offer insights on the design of interface agents to support Web-based browsing and searching. These are applied to the model in terms of the functionality required to facilitate information seeking and retrieval behaviour across library collections. Implications on library policy and digital collections surrounding the use of agents are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to highlight the retrieval effectiveness of search engines taking into consideration both precision and relative recall. Design/methodology/approach – The study is based on search engines that are selected on the basis of Alexa (Actionable Analytics for the web) Rank. Alexa listed top 500 sites, namely, search engines, portals, directories, social networking sites, networking tools, etc. But the scope of study is confined to only general search engines on the basis of language which was confined to English. Therefore only two general search engines are selected for the study . Alexa reports Google.com as the most visited website worldwide and Yahoo.com as the fourth most visited website globally. A total of 15 queries were selected randomly from PG students of Department of Library and Information Science during a period of eight days (from May 8 to May 15, 2014) which are classified manually into navigational, informational and transactional queries. However, queries are largely distributed on the two selected search engines to check their retrieval effectiveness as a training data set in order to define some characteristics of each type. Each query was submitted to the selected search engines which retrieved a large number of results but only the first 30 results were evaluated to limit the study in view of the fact that most of the users usually look up under the first hits of a query. Findings – The study estimated the precision and relative recall of Google and Yahoo. Queries using concepts in the field of Library and Information Science were tested and were divided into navigational queries, informational queries and transactional queries. Results of the study showed that the mean precision of Google was high with (1.10) followed by Yahoo with (0.88). While as, mean relative recall of Google was high with (0.68) followed by Yahoo with (0.31), respectively. Research limitations/implications – The study highlights the retrieval effectiveness of only two search engines. Originality/value – The research work is authentic and does not contain any plagiarized work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse and compare how austerity has influenced online sustainability information in Italy and Spain. Design/methodology/approach – The authors relate austerity policies to online information in order to ascertain whether austerity plays a role in the financial, organizational, social and environmental information disclosed on local government (LG) websites. The research has been conducted by analysing the websites of all Italian and Spanish LGs with more than 100,000 inhabitants. Findings – The results show that institutional and legislative pressures, as well as austerity measures, have played a relevant role in the increased production of information by LGs, although not all information is fully provided. Originality/value – The results may be of interest to managers and politicians as a stimulus to increase the flow of information. They may also be useful to policy makers, regulators and other stakeholders in order to foment environmental information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose an analytical model that shows causal relationships between the amount and nature of information on strategies and the governance of city councils, as well as the contents of different dimensions of sustainability that are disclosed on the websites of local governments in big European cities. This model could reveal if the information is disseminated in a homogeneous and coordinated way and could improve the quality of the information, its coherence and its comparability. Design/methodology/approach – The authors have designed a questionnaire with 75 variables from the Global Reporting Initiative proposal to specify information disclosed on sustainability. The level of information about each of these variables has been gathered by consulting the contents published on the websites of the 142 local governments in the sample. Finally the authors propose a model about the cause-effect relationships between the amount and nature of the information in different dimensions of sustainability on the websites of large cities’ local governments based on the structural equation modelling methodology. Findings – The model obtained reveals that there is coherence in the sustainability information disclosed by large European cities on their websites. However, it is demonstrated that the relations between the amount of information about strategies and the dissemination of information on each of the dimensions of sustainability (economic, social and environmental) do not have the same intensity. Originality/value – The proposed model can be useful as a reference framework to structure online information supplied in a balanced and comprehensive way. This conceptual model can suggest ways for sustainable improvements based on the experience of analysed local governments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the quality of online information about sexually transmitted diseases (STD) and determine which web sites are suitable for patients to read. Design/methodology/approach – This study evaluated the integrity, accessibility, readability, reliability, and completeness of 75 web sites providing information on one of five different types of STD. The Google AdWords Keywords Tool was used to determine the five most frequently searched STD terms: HIV, herpes, chlamydia, syphilis, and gonorrhoea. These five terms were then subjected to a Google search, and the first 15 web sites found for each term were evaluated. The web sites were assessed for integrity on the basis of a defined integrity score, accessibility on the basis of three levels of conformance to Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, readability on the basis of the Flesch Reading Ease score and the Flesch-Kincaid grade level, reliability on the basis of the LIDA instrument, and completeness on the basis of the quality appraisal instruments developed by the authors. Findings – The results suggested that the quality of information available on different web sites is inconsistent, and the information maintained by government web sites is most appropriate for general public users in terms of integrity, accessibility, readability, reliability, and completeness. Originality/value – There are currently no studies analysing the quality of online information about STDs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to determine whether the quality and reliability of websites’ content can be assessed through the lens of “wisdom of the crowds”. In particular as a case study the authors examine the information supplied over time on several prominent Israeli real estate websites. Design/methodology/approach – The Israeli real estate market was selected for the study, since there are many large, popular and dynamic real estate websites that feature hundreds of thousands of ads, representing most of the supply of real estate properties in the country. The authors built an automatic, ontology-based system that downloaded advertisements from three selected websites every two weeks for a number of months and checked for changes in these advertisements over time. The authors conjecture that wisdom of the crowds is mostly reflected by the information changes on the websites, since they indicate the anticipated market trends. Hence the authors developed a number of statistical measures to comparatively analyse trends of information changes on these websites, and assess their reliability compared to the actual market data and tendencies. Findings – The primary results suggest similar information change trends amongst all the websites. Surprisingly, although some properties did not sell over time, sellers generally did not lower their asking price and were willing to wait. Sellers even raised their asking price, apparently in anticipation of future price increases. Comparison of recurring trends among the websites with the trends of the real market during the same time period and a few months after reveals that wisdom of the crowds is only partially effective as an indicator and predictor of website content quality: it correctly reflects the fluctuation in demand, but not in the prices. Research limitations/implications – This study was conducted over a limited time period of five months, and only in several cities in Israel. Additionally, since buyers are not explicitly represented in these sites, their information behaviour was not analysed, although it undoubtedly influences information changes performed by the sellers. Practical implications – The practical contribution of this study is the ontology of the real estate world. Its assimilation by real estate websites would promote the development of their sites and user services. It would also enable ad sharing amongst the various websites and enable efficient searches by search engines. In addition the tools and measures that the authors developed will allow continued monitoring and analysis of user information change patterns. Originality/value – To the best of the knowledge this is the first study to examine and compare real estate websites’ quality and evaluate their information reliability as wisdom of the crowds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – Designing an effective university mobile website is becoming a necessity for universities. With the increasing percentage of students using smart phones to research colleges and universities, many university websites worldwide are moving towards addressing mobile needs. The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive mobile university evaluation framework that can be used to assess how universities' websites respond to the increasing demand for the mobile web, and also to identify trends and gaps in current services provided in universities' mobile websites. Design/methodology/approach – A framework was developed and applied to a set of 35 universities' mobile websites worldwide. The framework consists of four categories: interface, navigation, content and services offered, and technical aspects. Findings – Evaluation findings show that most universities' mobile websites performed well in terms of mobile-friendliness and functionality; however, suggestions for future improvements are given. Originality/value – No previous evaluation studies of this kind have been conducted. Moreover, this study provides an evaluation framework dedicated to the assessment of universities' mobile websites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – There has been an explosive growth of blog usage recently. However, little research has explored the forces motivating people to engage in blog activities. The purpose of this paper is to suggest that the driving forces to engage in blog participation not only includes utilitarian motivation (i.e. perceived usefulness) and hedonic motivation (i.e. perceived playfulness) but also habitual behaviour and social identity (blog identification). The quality of the blog is included as an antecedent to perceived usefulness and perceived playfulness. Design/methodology/approach – In total, 225 valid questionnaires were collected from blog users. Structural equation modelling was used to test the research hypothesis. Findings – The results show that blog users' intentions to participate in blogs are determined by all four key drivers: habit, perceived playfulness, blog identification, and perceived usefulness. Blog quality has an effect on perceived usefulness and perceived playfulness. Research limitations/implications – Previous studies emphasise the importance of perceived usefulness as the key determinant for user acceptance of technology. However, in the blog context this study finds habit, perceived playfulness, and blog identification have more significant effects on users' intention than perceived usefulness. Practical implications – Blog hosts should encourage habitual blog usage (habit), pay more attention to the hedonic nature of the blog (perceived playfulness) and establish a stronger sense of blog identification among participants, in order to retain active users. Originality/value – This study articulates and empirically validates a motivational research model of blog usage, helping researchers to better understand such behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – This study aims to understand how three political leaders – the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu; the Prime Minister of Britain, David Cameron; and the President of the United States of America, Barack Obama – communicate through Twitter. Design/methodology/approach – This paper presents an analysis of tweets produced between August and October 2010 by three political leaders, using statistical descriptive analysis and content analysis. Findings – The research shows that the US President tweets more than the other leaders, with the British Prime Minister tweeting the least, and that all three leaders use Twitter for both transparency and outreach. Originality/value – As Twitter has become widespread over the last few years, and several studies have focused on Twitter and its impact on different sectors in our society, it is interesting to focus on political leaders' use of Twitter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The objective of this paper is twofold: first to determine to what extent Spanish public hospitals are using their web sites to provide useful information to users and to improve hospital-patient relationships, and second to determine which factors have an influence on web site adoption and level of development over time. Design/methodology/approach - The web sites of public hospitals were searched for and analysed in 2005 and 2008. Their contents and features were scored using an 86-item checklist. Several hypotheses were proposed regarding the influence of internal and external factors on web site adoption and level of development. Logit and linear regressions were conducted to test the proposed hypotheses. Findings - Half of the Spanish public hospitals do not have a web site. The hospital web sites were acceptable in the information dimension but should improve their interactive features, as well as their navigation and usability. No significant improvements were observed during the period analysed. The size of the hospitals was a determining factor for web site adoption and level of development in both years. However, from 2005 to 2008, external factors - in particular internet penetration - became a significant factor to explain the adoption and level of development of web sites. Practical implications - Citizens are increasingly relying on the internet to search for health-related information. Hospital managers should exploit the advantages of implementing and properly developing a web site in order to improve the patient-care provider relationships and offer citizens reliable information about healthcare. Originality/value - To date, no empirical study has analysed the factors that influence the implementation of hospital web sites or the evolution of their contents and quality over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - This paper aims to improve understanding of the reasons why people trust the information about product recommendations on social shopping networks of websites, a new e-commerce method which combines social networking and shopping, and to investigate the impact of the trust on the consumers' intention to purchase products from the online shop of a website. Design/methodology/approach - An online survey instrument was developed to gather data, and 1,219 questionnaires were used to test the relationships in the proposed model. Findings - The results indicated that perceived ability, perceived benevolence/integrity, perceived critical mass, and trust in a website were four important antecedents of trust in product recommendation in a social networking site. In addition trust in product recommendations can influence the consumers' intention to purchase from the website through increasing their intention to purchase the products. Research limitations/implications - The research model demonstrated the importance of trust in product recommendations to online consumers' transaction intention. Practical implications - The results of the study showed that trust in product recommendations will influence consumers' purchase intentions. Therefore a social shopping website or the websites transforming into social shopping websites should put more emphasis on ways to establish the virtual communities or social networks which can provide the information about product recommendations that consumers trust. Originality/value - The study provides a comprehensive framework of the antecedents and effects of consumers' trust in recommendations in the context of social shopping. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to probe the external visibility of the web sites of all seven ALA-accredited Canadian library and information science (LIS) schools. The number of inlinks to the schools' web sites is used as an indicator of the visibility of all or some portions of the LIS web sites. Design/methodology/approach - Inlinks pointing to the LIS school web sites were collected using the AlltheWeb search engine. The LIS school web pages pointed to by inlinks were manually analysed to discover visible topics and contents. Findings - Four content clusters were identified by which to group the content of all the inlinked LIS school web pages. These clusters were LIS, research, home page and resources. The most visible cluster was the LIS cluster and the least visible was the research cluster. The most visible topics were student projects/activities, LIS-related resources and course-related information, in that order. The home page of each LIS school's web site was shown to be the single web page with the most visibility. Originality/value - This was a comparative webometric study, which collected and analysed inlinks for seven Canadian LIS school web sites at two different times, 3 years apart (2003 and 2006). In the study, the ranking of visible clusters, topics and web pages from the LIS web sites were identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - This paper aims to report on a web usability study and to identify and prioritise key web interface usability factors (WIUFs) for web sites of 36 student-related online services categorised into three groups: personal services, purchase services and study-related web sites. Design/methodology/approach - In this study, involving 400 student internet users (SIUs), 12,310 data points were collected and analysed using a multiple linear regression test. Seven WIUFs were tested: use of colour and font (UCF), use of graphics and multimedia (UGM), clarity of goals in web site (CGW), trustworthiness of web site (TOW), interactivity of web site (IOW), ease of web navigation (EWN), and download speed of web site (DSOW). Findings - The study results reveal that every online service category has a different set of crucial WIUFs. SIUs' web usability preferences were compared with those of general internet users. Research limitations/implications - The participants were all Malaysians; therefore, generalising the findings to all SIUs will require a confirmatory study with SIUs from other parts of the world. Practical implications - Web developers can use the results to design usable web sites for specific online service categories. Originality/value - The research offers a simpler alternative to measure web usability and to determine which WIUFs are crucial for a specific online service category with consideration of the users' role. This study overcomes some weaknesses of previous studies, i.e. small sample size, no consideration of product-task relationship, no specific customer group and cumbersome procedures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The purpose of this research is to investigate general patterns of tag usage and determines the usefulness of the tags used within university image groups to the wider Flickr community. There has been a significant rise in the use of Web 2.0 social network web sites and online applications in recent years. One of the most popular is Flickr, an online image management application. Design/methodology/approach - This study uses a webometric data collection, classification and informetric analysis. Findings - The results show that members of university image groups tend to tag in a manner that is of use to users of the system as a whole rather than merely for the tag creator. Originality/value - This paper gives a valuable insight into the tagging practices of image groups in Flickr. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The purpose of this research is to study the impact of reading a web site's privacy statement on the perceptions of control over privacy and trust in a cyber merchant. Design/methodology/approach - Two experiments were designed to monitor the actual reading of the privacy statement. Study one compares the influence of actual reading with self-reported claims. Study two manipulated the format of the privacy statement (opt-in or opt-out) and included a control condition to assess the influence of the presence of a privacy statement and the influence of the format on the dependent variables. Findings - The findings show that the mere presence of a privacy statement has a positive influence on perceived control. However, reading the privacy statement does not necessarily have a positive influence on perceived control and trust, contrary to commonly held assumptions. Participants who read the opt-in format felt significantly more control and trust than the participants who read the opt-out format. The opt-out format decreases perceived control compared with the group that did not read the privacy statement when it was available. Research limitations/implications - The sample size for both experiments was relatively modest, which limits the generalisability of the findings. Practical implications - Cyber merchants should devote particular attention to the strategic role of the format of the privacy statement. Originality/value - In contrast to other studies that relied on surveys, this paper assesses the impact of the actual reading of the privacy statement via an experimental approach. Moreover, the impact of the format of the privacy statement has been empirically tested. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - Most e-commerce web sites use HTML forms for user authentication, new user registration, newsletter subscription, and searching for products and services. The purpose of this paper is to present a method for automated classification of HTML forms, which is important for search engine applications, e.g. Yahoo Shopping and Google's Froogle, as they can be used to improve the quality of the index and accuracy of search results. Design/methodology/approach - Describes a technique for classifying HTML forms based on their features. Develops algorithms for automatic feature generation of HTML forms and a neural network to classify them. Findings - The authors tested their classifier on an e-commerce data set and a randomly retrieved data set and achieved accuracy of 94.7 and 93.9 per cent respectively. Experimental results show that the classifier is effective and efficient on both test beds, suggesting that it is a promising general purpose method. Originality/value - The paper is of value to those involved with information management and e-commerce. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The purpose of this article is to investigate how public and state libraries are responding to research recommendations that the usability of a web site for children is improved by involving a wide range of stakeholders and particularly the end-users, in its creation. Design/methodology/approach - The study employs a self-administered, structured e-mail questionnaire. Findings - The development of children's web pages is usually the responsibility of teams of internal stakeholders, with the librarians responsible overall for the library web site being involved most, followed by children's librarians. Other library staff, information technology staff from the parent organisation and external experts made smaller contributions. The target group of children were less involved and took informal, indirect roles, rather than the direct, formal roles recommended by research. Research limitations/implications - The sample size is small and includes only children's web pages in Australia and New Zealand. Originality/value - The paper presents a valuable analysis of stakeholder involvement in the development and maintenance of web sites for children among state and public libraries in Australia and New Zealand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The aim of this paper is to develop and implement a multidimensional classification system in the web that can provide an alternative but convenient structure for organising and finding information content. Design/methodology/approach - A prototype system is developed following the views of Ranganathan's faceted classification, which is to provide multiple classifications of the web documents through content oriented metadata organised under different facets (orthogonal groups of categories). Findings - Based on an architectural framework this study demonstrates a prototype faceted classification system (FCS) that is integrated into a general open-source content management system and populated with a sample collection of institutional web pages/documents. Originality/value - The study provides significant grounds for the IR community to improve interface structure for easy access, management, and retrieval of web information. In addition, the integration of content management tools with multidimensional taxonomies can be a new instance of a corporate web system for easy content creation, organisation, and navigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aims to investigate the internet web page metadata usage behavior in terms of their metadata element co-occurrences. Metadata are designed to facilitate both web publishers/authors to organize their web pages and search engines to index the web pages accurately. Design/methodology/approach: This study examines the types of metadata elements employed by different professional groups of web authors, the number of elements they prefer to use, and the types of element combinations they typically embed in their pages' HTML code. Findings: The findings reveal that the keyword and description elements were the most popular single elements. The most popular combination of two elements was that of keyword and description. Very few authors included combinations of five elements. This study also shows that preferences for element combinations varied by domains. Originality/value: This approach will enhance the current understanding of metadata usage behavior and may help search engine designers as they continue their quest for improved indexing and retrieval of web pages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]