(one has to be registered for the search) After some research, we selected the following sites: Of what we judged the “most important forums” according to our research criteria. Meta tags may have nothing to do with the site content, but they link to the site header.Īs this approach does not lead to a really high level of standardisation, we applied another method: 1.2.1.2 Weighted Google Search (with an empty cache) And the tags are also read differently: there are tags structured by text, and there are meta tags. The ranking in this special snapshot moment, when we are searching and accessing the sites also differs depending on your cache and cookies and on how their algorithm is/may be optimized by their owners. So, as an experiment, we accessed the sites with different browsers like “ Mozilla”, “Safari”, “Firefox”, “Opera” and “Chrome”. Sure, this access to web sites is not standardizing the method much: Web sites are ranked differently day by day (minute by minute), according to the browser one is using.
We analysed the first ten sites found with these tags on one single test day. “ Fall Berliner Mauer” (fall of the Berlin Wall) “ Ende des kommunistischen Blocks”, “Ende ost-west-Konfrontation” (end ofĬommunist block, end of east-west confrontation) “ Judenvernichtung”, “Shoah”, “Holocaust” “ Widerstand gegen Nationalsozialismus (im besetzten Europa)” (resistance) We applied two methods: 1.2.1.1 Open Google Search (with an empty cache) for As “Wikipdia” entries may be nationally different (if they are not only translations of the US “Wikipedia” site) but exist in every country, this could be a good chance to compare them with an identical method of analysis. Our hypothesis: In the more communicative forums and the 2.0-websites with feedback functions we learn much more about the current state of people’s knowledge, opinions, feelings, hopes and fears than in the static Web 1.0 sites provided by more or less official institutions.Īnalysing the “Wikipedia”-site seems easy compared to the “rest” of the analysis. We analysed German sites with the extension “.de”, exclusively, and primarily historical forums as well as (Web 1.0-) sites of institutions and (Web 2.0- 1 ) sites of newspapers. Is it mentioned in a friendly or diffident way?ĭo allusions include, at times, references to Europe or to the European idea?
Is the past that is mentioned exclusively national or related to other nations? – Are there any hints at the history of other countries, or at Europe? 1.1.2 Special RQs: – To what extent are/aren’t they developed? What are the historical topics that surface in the everyday talks conveyed on the Web? Here are the research questions (RQs) of the project: 1.1.1 Basic research questions (RQs): This is even more true,Īs the Web provides such a huge amount of communication content, even if you confine your research questions to a smaller focus of topics and countries Īs Web content analysis has not yet reached a methodologically and internationally standardized level as this is (more or less) the case with newspaper and film analysis – only to mention the younger methodsĪnd as Web terminology is not yet really internationally standardized, either, as this is (more or less) the case with film and broadcasting studies terminology, and this applies even if we all use the same English terms as “Web 1.0/2.0”, “thread”, “post”, blog” etc. We understand this project as a whole and this paper especially as a pilot study for a more in-depth research.