A WORD FROM THE SPONSOR: TIPS ON CITING INTERNET SOURCES
        by Brian Mavrogeorge, The Learning Company
           

Source citation basics include identifying who wrote the information, the form
in which the information appeared, and who the publisher and/or repository of
the information were. Provide enough detail to permit some evaluation of the
source and to enable yourself and others to find the exact source you used. 

In EVIDENCE! CITATION & ANALYSIS FOR THE FAMILY HISTORIAN, Elizabeth Shown
Mills, CG, CGL, FASG, FNGS, applies these basics to the Internet. To make it
easy to follow her guidelines, Ultimate Family Tree (UFT)
 contains source templates authorized by Mills. UFT
users can document sources easily by selecting a fill-in-the-blanks template and
answering these questions:

1. Who wrote the information? This is the author, the compiler, Webmaster or
creator of the Web page. Because electronic mail addresses such as
JohnSmith@fastsurf.com and URLs (universal resource locators) -- addresses of
Web sites -- change frequently, Mills recommends that you also provide a postal
address of the originator.

2. What is its form? This might be "e-mail to author," "family file," or
"Stanton Family Association Web site."

3. Who published the information or in what repository is it located? This
should identify the e-mail user, the Webmaster's name, or the name of the
organization. It also could be the page's URL.

4. When was it received? Because of the issue of permanence (or lack thereof) of
information found on the Internet, indicate the date the information was
downloaded or received.

To facilitate evaluating the reliability of the source, cite not only the
Internet source, but also the source on which it is based. Has the Webmaster
done a partial or full extraction from the original record? Are these simply
random bits and pieces of information from unidentified original or secondary
sources? This is important because most of the information on the Internet
originated in some other medium and is simply being published on the Internet by
someone other than the original creator. 

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Previously published by RootsWeb Genealogical Data Cooperative, RootsWeb Review,
Vol. 2, No. 8, 24 February 1999. Please visit RootsWeb's main Web page at
. ROOTSWEB REVIEW is e-mailed on Wednesdays to all
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