Perspectives of webometrics

Since the mid-1990s has emerged a new research field, webometrics, investigating the nature and properties of the Web drawing on modern informetric methodologies. The article attempts to point to selected areas of webometric research that demonstrate interesting progress and space for development as well as to some currently less promising areas. Recent investigations of search engine coverage and performance are reviewed as a frame for selected quality and content analyses. Problems with measuring Web Impact Factors (Web-IF) are discussed. Concluding the article. new directions of webometrics are outlined for performing knowledge discovery and issue tracking on the Web, partly based on bibliometric methodologies used in bibliographic and citation databases. In this framework graph theoretic approaches, including path analysis, transversal links, "weak ties" and "small-world" phenomena are integrated.