The title of my search service evaluation is U.S. Census Bureau.

The URL of the site is: http://www.census.gov

The site was made in March of 2004 by the U.S. Census Internet Staff.

It was recently modified March 8, 2006 and I visited the site on March 20, 2006.

            At first glance I wasn’t exactly sure what the site was supposed to represent aside from being government related. I clicked on “About the Bureau” and it pulled up a lot of information. A brief description of the mission of the site and there goal. Then they have a lot of links on the history of U.S Census, how to use the data found on the site, and how to get in contact with people involved with the bureau, and activities, and more.

            The FAQs section of the site had a lot of information about our nation’s people and economy. There is also a section that lets their customers ask questions and get replies. And another section that is labeled “My Stuff” that allows users to make there own account so they can keep tract of articles that they found useful. They can also use there account to receive up dated information, and answer to questions.  

            The text and graphics are very plain and generic. But it is a government information web site so I think it is appropriate that there aren’t a lot of bells and whistles. The page layout is very professional. Things are labeled clearly and it makes it very easy to search for things.

            The first search that I typed in was for Hurricane Katrina. It listed a few different links that brought me to there Hurricane Data base which covered information about not only hurricane Katrina but also hurricane Wilma and Rita. It had information on everything. Economy, people, housing, and maps. I was very surprised at all the information that was pulled up, it was extremely helpful.

            The Second search that I typed in was for U.S. Population. It brought me to a monthly estimate for the population of the USA. Its list there monthly estimates from 2000 to 2005. And they have divided it up into categories. It’s really cool to literally see the numbers get larger as the years went on.

            As far as I could see there were on “sponsored” sites that I could find, so it makes it difficult to know for sure if the information is accurate.

The Help section is just that, helpful. It was divided into three sections. One for first time visitors, one for finding the data that you need, and one for how you can use there data. They also provide a customer service number.

            There wasn’t really anything unique about the service this site provided.

It was very professional and to the point, I liked that a lot. I would defiantly use this site if I need to look up some facts about population and world hunger. It provided a lot of great facts, but not to much information.