The Web as a subject discipline
Vol. 1, no. 1 of Webology is up. What is Webology?
We are delighted to welcome you to the first issue of the journal of "Webology", the first international journal on Webology (the study of the Web, Web science and technology), With your help we aim to make this journal the premier publication for this new era of science. This is a trial issue of Webology which publishes papers by researchers and students about the World Wide Web.
They then ask the obvious question:
Why does the world need the Webology?The Internet, and more specifically, the World Wide Web has a significant impact on many areas of sciences, engineering and medicine. We intent to introduce the Web impact on society, communication, research and development. The World Wide Web has a greater impact on communications and society than any other technology and it has only just started. The Web, as the most publicized and fastest growing aspect of the Internet, is increasingly important as a source of educational resources, commercial information, news, and government data.
As stated by Bjorneborn & Ingwersen in Scientometrics (2001), since the Web consists of contributions from anyone who wishes to contribute, the quality of information or knowledge value is opaque due to the lack of kinds of peer reviewing. On the other hand, because the Web is an unstructured and highly complex conglomerate of all types of information carriers produced by all kinds of people and searched by all kind of users it is tempting to investigate; and journal of Webology indeed offers some methodologies to start from.
I have no idea if it will reach the same levels of renown and authority as D-Lib or First Monday, but it could provide some interesting cross-displinary research. One hopes. Fingers crossed.