The lifespan of "Informetrics" on the web: an eight year study (1998-2006), Bar-Ilan, J; Peritz, BC PROCEEDINGS OF ISSI 2007: 11TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE ISSI, VOLS I AND II. 2007. p.52-62

[Eugene Garfield]

Email address: barilaj at mail.biu.ac.il

Author(s): Bar-Ilan, J (Bar-Ilan, Judit); Peritz, BC (Peritz, Bluma C.) 
Title: The lifespan of "Informetrics" on the web: an eight year study 
(1998-2006)
 
Editor(s): TorresSalinas, D; Moed, HF
 
Source: PROCEEDINGS OF ISSI 2007: 11TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE 
INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR SCIENTOMETRICS AND INFORMETRICS, VOLS I AND II 
52-62, 2007 

Cited Reference Count: 30 

Language: English 
Document Type: Article 

Conference Title: 11th International Conference of the International-
Society-for-Scientrometrics-and-Informetrics 

Conference Date: JUN 25-27, 2007 

Conference Location: Madrid, SPAIN
 
Conference Sponsors: Int Soc Scientrometr & Informetr, CSIC, Minist Educ & 
Ciencia, FECYT, Comunidad Madrid, Eugene Garfield Fdn, Thomson Sci, 
Elsevier, Journal Informetr, Scopus, Ayuntamiento Madrid, Sci Metrix, Univ 
Carlos III Madrid 

Author Keywords: informetrics; longitudinal web study; web evolution; 
growth decay 

KeyWords Plus: LINK ROT; PERSISTENCE; REFERENCES; EVOLUTION; PAGES; DECAY
 
Abstract: The World Wide Web is growing at an enormous speed, and has 
become an indispensable source for information and research. New pages are 
constantly added, but there are additional processes as well: pages are 
moved or removed and/or their content changes. We report here the results 
of an eight year long project started in 1998, when multiple search 
engines were used to identify a set of pages containing the term 
informetrics. Data collection was repeated once a year for the last eight 
years (with the exception of 2000 and 2001) using both search engines and 
revisiting previously identified pages. The results show that the number 
of pages grew from 866 in 1998 to 28,914 in 2006 - a 33-fold growth. 
Besides the obvious growth of the topic on the Web, we observed both decay 
(pages disappearing from the Web) and modification. Even though most of 
the pages from 1998 either disappeared or ceased to contain the term 
informetrics, 165 pages (19.1%) still exist in 2006 and contain the search 
term. We followed the "fate" of these 165 pages: characterized the 
publishers, the contents and the changes that occurred the whole period. 
In recent years e-print servers and publishers' sites became sources of 
large number of pages related to informetrics. Longitudinal studies 
following the evolution of a topic on the Web are very important, since 
they provide insights about content and the underlying Web processes. 

Addresses: Bar Ilan Univ, Dept Informat Sci, Ramat Gan, IL-52900 Israel.
 
Cited References: 
BAEZAYATES R, 2003, P 1 LAT AM WEB C LA
BARILAN J, 1999, SCIENTOMETRICS, V46, P371
BARILAN J, 2000, J AM SOC INFORM SCI, V51, P432
BARILAN J, 2004, J AM SOC INF SCI TEC, V55, P980
BREWINGTON BE, 2000, COMPUTER, V33, P52
CASSERLY MF, 2003, COLL RES LIBR, V64, P300
CHO J, 2000, P 26 INT C VER LARG, P200
FETTERLY D, 2004, SOFTWARE PRACT EXPER, V34, P213
GOH DH, 2006, IN PRESS JASIST
GOMES D, 2006, P 6 INT C WEB ENG PA, P193
KE YP, 2006, COMPUT NETW, V50, P1430
KIM SJ, 2005, LECT NOTES COMPUT SC, V3399, P632
KOEHLER W, 2004, INFORM RES, V9
KRIPPENDORFF K, 2003, CONTENT ANAL INTRO I
LAWRENCE S, 2001, COMPUTER, V34, P26
MARKWELL J, 2003, BIOCHEM MOL BIOL EDU, V31, P69
MCCOWN F, 2005, 5 INT WEB ARCH WORKS
MIZZARO S, 1998, INTERACTING COMPUTER, V10, P305
NELSON ML, 2002, D LIB MAGAZINE 1112, V8
NEUDORF KA, 2001, CONTENT ANAL GUIDEBO
NTOULAS A, 2004, P 13 INT C WORLD WID, P1
ORTEGA JL, 2006, SCIENCE, V32, P344
ROUSSEAU R, 1999, CYBERMETRICS, V2
SARACEVIC T, 1998, P 2 C CONC LIB INF S, P201
SELLITTO C, 2005, J AM SOC INF SCI TEC, V56, P695
SPINELLIS D, 2003, COMMUN ACM, V46, P71
TOYODA M, 2006, P WWW 2006, P233
TYLER DC, 2003, PORTAL-LIBR ACAD, V3, P615
WREN JD, 2004, BIOINFORMATICS, V20, P668
WREN JD, 2006, ARCH DERMATOL, V142, P1147 

Publisher Name: INT SOC SCIENTOMETRICS & INFORMETRICS-ISSI 

Publisher Address: KATHOLIEKE UNIV LEUVEN, FACULTEIT E T E W, DEKENSTRAAT 
2, LEUVEN, B-3000, BELGIUM