Business Information on the Internet: Let the researcher beware!
Google and Wikipedia are 2 tools that are available to help you find information on the Internet. Google is an Internet search engine. It will find websites for you on the subject of international business. Wikipedia is a collaborative encyclopedia.It contains lots of information about businesses. But you need to be careful when using these 2 tools. Google will just find sites for you. It will not tell you whether or not those sites are accurate, or unbiased, or current. Wikipedia can be useful to help you get started finding information. But because anybody can edit a Wikipedia page, you have to take information you find there with a grain of salt. Wikipedia is a fine source for some information--but always backup information you find there with another source.
Finding information about your market, company or business idea on the Internet can be tricky. Lots of what you will find out there is advertising, or propaganda. Always try to confirm the information you find in another source, like an article from a reputable news source in one of the databases.
Some Global Business Web Sites
Yahoo Finance ~ Nice source for company information, breaking news sources, market and investing tips. Beware, here, tho, there are many links that will lead you to sources that want you to pay for information--NEVER do this unless you have first asked a librarian for help.
Portfolio.com~ this is an online version of a magazine that has lots of good (and free!) information on it. It has some limitations--it's only US based companies and seesm to be mostly the "big" ones, but if you are looking for information on big competitors, try here.
The Universal Currency Convertor - How much are those yen or rupees in dollars?
Penn World Table ~ This is a complicated tool to use, but has lots of data on population, GDP, consumption, etc, from 1951-2004. Choose the data link and select your country and the variables you want. It generates a table (can be in .csv form which Excel will open). If you click on the category titles it will tell you more about what they mean and give you the option of opening a pdf with the PWT manual.
Stat-USA - From the Dept. of Commerce, look up information of interest to the U.S. business, economic, and trade community.
The International Forum on Globalization "The International Forum on Globalization (IFG) is an alliance of sixty leading activists, scholars, economists, researchers and writers formed to stimulate new thinking, joint activity, and public education in response to economic globalization."
Economic Policy Institute: Trade & Globalization Resources and news from the Economic Policy Institute.
The Globalization Website This site, maintained by a Sociology professor at Emory University, contains many good resources including links to other websites.
World Bank Globalization Website Many links to information about globalization, look for links on menu on left.
Intellectual Property Law Server "The Server provides information about intellectual property law including patent, trademark and copyright. Resources include comprehensive links, general information, space for professionals to publish articles and forums for discussing related issues."
businessculture.com "Here you will find a series of reports on business customs, etiquette, cross-cultural communication, proper gifts, negotiating tactics, business culture, manners, business entertainment and much more."
Web Site Evaluation
Now that you know which search engine to use and how to construct an effective search, how do you know if the sites that you have found are any good? Are they reliable? Scholarly?
Five Criteria for Evaluating Web Sites - from Cornell University Library
Thinking Critically About World Wide Web Resources - UCLA College Library back to top |
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, or this line of text: (Find this resource with SFX) next to the article citation on the search screen. Clicking on this will take you to a list of our full-text sources that carry the journal, if we have it. It will also help you get a copy of the article in paper if necessary