Information Quality Assessment and Source Selection on the Internet for Competitive Intelligence: Fieldwork Research on 53 executives

Authors

  • Jeremy Depauw Dpt SIC, Université Libre de Bruxelles

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15847/obsOBS332009235

Keywords:

web 2.0, social media, competitive intelligence, information quality, source selection, environmental scanning

Abstract

The internet is seen as a challenging workspace for Corporate Communication and Information Management purposes. It enables a growing number of people to publish, share and relay information on any subject. The recent emergence of user-friendly content creation tools and networking facilities has increased that phenomenon and brought new settings to the informational landscape of organizations. We argue that the evolution of internet has created new needs in practices and theoretical understanding of information quality assessment and source selection. Based on a survey of corporate information specialists in the private sector in Belgium, the study examines the perceived shift of information quality assessment criteria when dealing with online sources. This paper aims to present a conciliation of usual information evaluation criteria to five formats of information sources, considered as specific to what people call Web 2.0: weblogs, wikis, podcasts, file sharing platforms and social networks sites. 53 phone interviews were conducted in 2008. Results confirms the existence of a perceived shift in the information quality assessment process. They suggests that it remains globally the same, but that it mostly needs to be adapted to better cope with the new reality of sources formats. Nuances to this observation are discussed in this paper.

Author Biography

Jeremy Depauw, Dpt SIC, Université Libre de Bruxelles

Jeremy Depauw is a PhD student at the French speaking University of Brussels (ULB - Belgium). His research investigate the way coroporate information managers assess the quality of information and select online sources in the reconfigured information landscape: what people call Web 2.0. His thesis supports that new trends, tools, practices and modalities of online content creation cause an uncertainty in information quality assessment that changes the perceived importance information quality criteria and force corporate information management professionals to reconsider their selection and validation processes. His dissertation is due to May 2009.

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Published

2009-11-06

How to Cite

Depauw, J. (2009). Information Quality Assessment and Source Selection on the Internet for Competitive Intelligence: Fieldwork Research on 53 executives. Observatorio (OBS*), 3(3). https://doi.org/10.15847/obsOBS332009235

Issue

Vol. 3 No. 3 (2009)

Section

Articles

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