Assessing U.S. federal government websites

Abstract The exponential growth of federal Websites is outpacing federal information management policy guidelines. Federal Websites are potentially rich information resources, and the Web may well become the preeminent channel for disseminating federal information. Legitimate policy issues associated with the use of this new information dissemination channel should be assessed. This article provides an overview of information policy issues which affect federal Websites and introduces assessment techniques which federal Website designers and administrators could use to evaluate the design and management of their Web-based information resources.