Abstract
This chapter introduces Webometrics as an emerging discipline focused on the understanding and assessment of the flow of Web based academic information. It describes the principal web-based techniques and tools used to evaluate the performance of higher education websites and to explain how these information networks are created and modelled. The chapter begins with an introduction to Webometrics: its origin and evolution, its theoretical framework and its relationship with other web disciplines. The principal indicators and measures used to quantify the development of several web units (web domains, sites and pages) are described. Emphasis is placed on the properties of social-network measures in order to describe the visibility of a web site and to characterise the structure of a web space. Major developments, such as the Ranking of World universities on the Web and visualisations of web regions, are considered. Finally, there is a discussion about the implications of this discipline on the improvement of web performance and visibility of the university institutions on the Web and its impact on the development of the higher education web-based policies according to open access and e-learning initiatives.
Webometrics: a discipline devoted to the quantification of the performance of the Web
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Ortega, J.L., Aguillo, I.F. (2011). Social Network Tools for the Assessment of the University Web Performance. In: White, B., King, I., Tsang, P. (eds) Social Media Tools and Platforms in Learning Environments. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-20392-3_11
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