Internet Research

1. Internet Research Finding Free and Fee-based Obituaries Online

2. Overview of this TutorialIn the following slides, you will have a chance to compare free and fee resources for finding obituaries online. You will also learn several search strategies. After a general introduction to the pros and cons of free and fee resources, several options are given for finding information online.Many of the concepts and search strategies explored in this presentation apply not only to finding obituaries online, but also to finding other types of information. Hopefully, you will learn about new ways to search, new places to search, and new ways to evaluate the quality of the information available online. Whether or not something is free or costs a fee often tells you a lot about the quality. You’ll probably notice that a lot of high quality information on the Internet is no longer available for free. However, the Internet does offer unique and current information that is of a high quality. For this reason, it would be incorrect to say that what is free is bad and what we pay a fee for is good in terms of quality. Instead, we present pros and cons for each type of information and offer you practical search options. You’ll learn to use all resources carefully .

3. A Little Advice…Print This Power Point Presentation You may have an easier time following the suggestions in this tutorial if you print out the screens for this presentation as guide. Otherwise, you are going to have to manage keeping several Windows open at once. Use the print option that allows you to put several slides on a page.

4. Fee or Free? When looking for information online, you always have to ask yourself, “Should I search for a freesource or one that requires a fee?” Although the answer may seem simple—don’t we always want free information?—it’s not that easy. There are differences in terms of what you can get for free or for a fee. Read the next two slides to help you consider the pros and cons of using free or fee sources.

5. Pro & Con of Free Sources • Pro Free: Using a search engine like www.google.com, you can find unique Web sites with information that would not be available in the fee or subscription sources. (Fee or subscription databases store information from sources that were previously in print.) Since any organization or person can post information on the Internet without it ever having been in print, you’ll find unique information on Web sites on the Internet. Also, current obituaries could be free online by simply going to an online news source. • Con Free: It is harder to search for information that is very old or very specific using general search engines such as Google or Yahoo. In sources that require a fee, the information is more organized, goes back many years, and may be of a higher quality since it was previously published in print source. Also, searching is often made easier because you can search by name, year, type of information desired, etc. This is called “field searching.”

6. Pro & Con of Fee Sources • Pro Fee: Fee or subscription databases allow the user to search for very specific information. Thousands of articles can be searched simultaneously by name, date, publication, etc. Since most of the information was previously published in a print newspaper, magazine or journal, you avoid the uncertainty inherent in using materials taken from free Web sites that may or may not have been reviewed. • Con Fee: The biggest drawback to fee sources is that they cost money. However, many fees can be bypassed if you use fee databases offered by a library you belong to. Later, we’ll show you how to log into and search Boise State’s databases. Another drawback to fee databases is that they don’t contain the type of unique information that you might find on the Internet. On the Internet you’ll find personal and organization Web pages that contain information not available anywhere else.

7. Search Options for Finding Free Obituaries In the next few slides, you will find several search options for finding free information online.

8. Option #1: Go Directly to a News Source • Option #1: Go to individual newspapers, magazines, or news sites that you already know to find current obituaries. Unless you already know the Web site URL, simply go to a search engine like www.google.com, put the name of the newspaper or organization in parenthesis and click search. (Example: “New York Times”, “Newsweek” or “CNN”. It’s a good idea to get into the habit of putting “parenthesis” around titles even though it’s not always necessary.) Remember: Going to a direct source is really only good for recent information unless you want to pay a fee for old copies. Click on Obituaries

9. Option #2: Go to a Subject Directory • Option #2: Go to specific Web sites that contain collections of obituaries. An easy way to find Web sites in a particular category—in this case obituaries—is to use a subject directory. Subject directories are like little libraries that organize Web sites into categories. Google and Yahoo both have subject directories. To go to the subject directory of Google, simply go to the main page and then: • Click on “more” (see picture) • Click on “Directory” • Click on the category “Society,” then “Genealogy” then “Obituaries.” You’ll receive a list of Web sites that have been put in that category. Many of the Web sites here offer to find obituaries for a fee (don’t…you’ll see how to do it for free in a few slides!), but there are some unique sites. Look at “Goodbye! The Journal of Contemporary Death” and “The Blog of Death.”

10. Search Options for Finding Obituaries thatRequire a Fee In the next few slides, you will find several search options for finding information online that requires a fee. Many subscription databases available in your library cost a fee. They are free to you since you are a member, a student, but the concepts of using passwords and subscribing is related to fee services for information.

11. Option #1: Go to Database on the Internet • Option #1:When you search the Internet, you will often get back Web sites that allow you to search for information. To actually get that information, you must pay a fee or subscribe. When you search for obituaries, you will find many such databases online. A very high-quality site is Ancestry.com. To the right you see you can search in many ways. These are called “fields.” The advantage of the paid subscription services is that they usually include a HUGE amount of sources from around the country. Many of them go back over 100 years. Also, you don’t have to belong to a library or be a student to use them. You can join for a yearly rate or pay per article. You will find many other fee databases to search when you look in the subject directory list. Search Fields

12. Option #2: Go to a Database Owned By Your Library • Option #2: Boise State subscribes to several subscription databases. These are fee subscription services available for free to members and students. One of them--National Newspapers--allows you to search for obituaries. Here are the steps for opening the database through the Internet from school or home: • Go to www.boisestate.edu; • Click on the word “Library” located in the blue bar on the left-hand side • Click on “Articles Indexes and Databases” on the library Web site.

13. Option #2: Go to a Database Owned By Your Library…continued • Now you will see a list of subscription databases. Scroll down to the database called “National Newspapers.” Click to open. • Enter your username and password. If there are problems, call the numbers on this page. Remember, this a fee-based database. This database contains a collection of articles from newspapers around the country. Many of these newspapers would normally charge you a fee to do this research, but, since you are a student, the articles are available to you for free. The next screen will show you how to search using the available fields.

14. Option #2: Go to a Database Owned By Your Library…continued • When the database opens, you will be on the Basic Search screen. The orange tab at the top will say “Basic Search.” This is not good. Click immediately on “Advanced Search.” You will see that tab turns orange like the screen to the right. • Now, you have many options for searching. The three blank boxes at the top allow you to search different search fields. For this research, you want the first box to say “obituaries” and the one next to it to say “document type.” • The other thing you have to do is put a check in the box that says “Full text.” This way, the obituaries you find will actually appear online. You can print them out. • Finally, in the other search boxes at the top you can search a variety of fields. Try a person you are interested in or a subject. Experiment. • When you click “search” you will get results that you can open, read, email or print.

15. Fee or Free…What Do You Think Now? You’ve had the chance to work with both free and fee sources. Hopefully, you’ve learned some new places to look for information and, perhaps more importantly, some new ways to think about resources. This time we were only looking for obituaries, but in future tutorials many of the procedures for searching and describing sources are the same. Finding what you want takes time, especially when we look for quality information. Although the Internet makes it seem that good information is quickly found, that’s often not the case. Some of the best information can be found in databases that take quite some time to learn.