Finding Reliable Information on the Web Should and Can Still Be Improved

Abstract

This paper addresses two major weaknesses of locating rather specific information on the Web: First, to find information for a specific topic is still quite difficult. Second, if located, the degree of reliability of the information is not clear. We explain that much progress has been made concerning the first issue, yet the real issue is never explicitly mentioned: The interaction between user and the search engine has to be good enough so that the search engine really knows what the user wants. We will discuss a new approach to solve this. Concerning the second aspect we will show that no serious large-scale attempts have been made to help users to judge the reliability of information found. We propose a set of measures that would change the situation dramatically.