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Online Resources
BASIC
STUDY GUIDE
Need To Find
Something On The Internet?
Search Engines
Need To Do Some Business
Research?
Need More Business
Information?
Need To Do Some General
Research?
Need To Locate A
Government Agency?
Need To Locate A
Professional Organization?
Want To Read A Newspaper?
Want To Read A Magazine?
The Internet is
composed of more than 20 million host computers and tons
and tons of information. When we refer to the World Wide Web, we are
referring to the graphical portion of the Internet. The key to doing
effective research on the Internet is getting to the right information
quickly. There
are a number of excellent sites that will provide you with the "basics"
of
using the Internet and pointers on using Internet search engines to find
the information you need. Some of these sites include:
Getting Started on the
Internet
A helpful and
intelligent introduction to the Internet from the Imaginary
Landscape team.
Guide and Tutorial
Multilingual guide
offers a humane introduction to the basics of cyberspace.
Zen
and the Art of the Internet
Search Engines
The most
popular search engines are:
All of these "general"
search engines will yield different results given similar
search criteria. This is because each search engine is organized
differently
and uses different databases. If there is too much information for you
as a
result of a search, look more closely at the advanced search options
that
are provided by many of the search engines. If you follow their
instructions,
you can effectively narrow your search.
There are also
"specialized" search engines, such as:
Research in
economics and business requires familiarity with a number of
different kinds of sources: statistical, informational, and analytical.
The
researcher may need demographic data, sales figures, analysis of a
trend,
or up-to-date information on changes in a given industry. This section
provides leads to research tools for economics and business.
CEO Express
This site offers links to a vast collection of business resources.
Researching
Companies Online
An excellent guide to the process of researching companies with lots of
links to the tools used in the research process.
Corporate
Information
This site provides
information on publicly traded companies (i.e., companies
that trade on one of the stock markets), privately held companies,
regional-
based sites (i.e., companies in one particular region), and
sector-specific
sites that contain information about companies within a particular
sector
or industry.
The Forbes 500 Top Private Companies
This list
gives the top 500 private companies and their ranking. Clicking on
the company names gives more information and a brief write-up on the
firm. Originally
published in Forbes magazine.
Business Journals
Business
Journals publishes metropolitan business newspapers in 35
American cities. Most of the news on the site is directed toward small
businesses.
Annual Report
Service
The Public Register's Annual Report Service (PRARS) offers "company
financials, including annual reports, prospectuses or 10k's on over
3,200
public companies" free of charge to the U.S. investing public.
Hoover’s Online
Hoover's Online also features links to news, lists, stock quotes, and
other products,
such as Hoover's Industry Snapshots (global industry
overviews). Hoover's offers
approximately 14,000 company capsules (brief
company descriptions and financials) for
free, and approximately 4,000
company
profiles (company histories, strategies, market
positions, major events,
and
other information) available via online subscription.
Thomas Register
A large index of
manufacturers: you can search on the name or the product
of the 155,000 U.S. and Canadian companies in its database.
CorpTech Database
This site
lists 45,000 manufacturers and developers of high-tech products.
This site also has lots of other demographic information and good search
features.
This section
contains sites that may also be of assistance in researching a
private (or public) company. The following sites don't have corporate
profiles,
but they may tell you something interesting when you are researching a
company. Sites with raw data are often better research sources than
sites
that attempt to rank the "best" companies.
U.S. Patent and Trademark Database
Sometimes
it is useful to know what (if any) patents a company has. This
site will help you search, but remember that sometimes a patent might be
in the individual inventor's name or perhaps in the name of a
subsidiary. Of
course, you can also check individuals' patents here.
Copyright Research
Research
copyrights registered since 1978 at the Library of Congress.
RTK Net Environmental Databases
Provided
by the Right-to-Know Network, this site contains mirrors of various
government databases about environmental issues that companies face.The
searching takes a bit of getting used to, but there are help files
available.
Environmental Scorecard
This site
is supported by the nonprofit League of Conservation Voters (LCV).
It
provides objective, bipartisan, factual information about the
environmental
voting records of all Members of Congress.
Occupational Safety & Health
Administration
Get all
Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) inspections
and violations noted since 1972.
Federal Trade Commission
With this
searchable archive, you can search Formal Actions to see if the
FTC has ever taken action against a company.
Federal Election Commission
Find out
if a company or other organization has given "soft money,” and to
whom.
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