Internet Data Collection for Research

This website contains presentations and other materials from the PhD-level course "Scientific Data Collection for Business" offered until 2011 at University of Mayrland's Smith School of Business. We decided to democratize this information for the benefit of all researchers in the age of Internet data.

The course focuses on collecting data for scientific research in the Internet age. In particular, it covers three popular data collection methods: experiments, surveys, and Web collection technologies. Although these have been the most common data collection methods in the offline world, the uniqueness of this course is that it discusses them in an online context where the data and/or the collection mechanism are online. In particular, Internet experiments, online and email surveys, and web crawling and other tools for collecting Internet data are covered.

The course teaches tools for designing efficient and ethical data collection plans and executing them. It discusses statistical, ethical, technological and practical aspects of collecting data in an online environment. It also covers the academic approval process necessary for conducting human subjects research in the USA.

Designed by Professor Galit Shmueli in 2007, offered yearly and updated by Prof Galit Shmueli and Prof Inbal Yahav until 2011.