The Potential Is Lost

As with many new technologies, the Web is far from fully understood. Major problems which surround the Web concern the mass of information which is now currently available.

"Without tools and methodologies for gathering, evaluating, managing, and presenting information, the Web's potential as a universe of knowledge could be lost." (December, 1994, online)

Information Explosion

The explosion of information on the Web has created an expansion both in terms of amount and diversity. Although one may argue this is a good thing, it has lead to the problems of information saturation and pollution.

Saturation is defined as the problem of there being so much information that a human being can't adequately compare the value of available information. At the beginning of the development of the Web, 20 webs existed. This meant that a user could easily browse through all of the material available. Now with 20,000,000 webs available, the user has a much bigger problem. Web space has become cluttered, perhaps with many useless pages. To solve the problem of saturation, information must be layered or filtered by way of indexes and other guides.

Pollution is defined as redundant, erroneous or poorly maintained information that can obscure other, more important, information. Link staleness is an example of poorly maintained information.

Lack of Design

Many Web sites have been composed without an overall structure in mind.

"[with respect to companies who advertise themselves as web designers] These companies often portray Web information development as equivalent to 'HTML coding'. This is analogous to holding the view that creating business and professional communication only requires typing skills." (December, 1996, online)

A poor design means that users have difficulty understanding what they are viewing, as well as navigating within it.

Bandwidth

Sites which contain pages with massive graphics, or highly popular sites are subject to the restrictions of bandwidth. This introduces problems of Internet "traffic jams", where the transmission of data is brought to a standstill.