Editorial

 
 
 
Acknowledgments
Alphabetical List of Files
Awards and Recognition
Copyright
Editorial Notebook
Guided Tour
Historic Milestones
Journal
Media Coverage
Site File List
Site Index
Site Useage
Submissions
Update Archive
Use of Images
What is new?
 
 

Welcome to the site Micronesia, an electronic library and archive. The site is maintained from Albury, New South Wales, Australia. It it is now on .

 

One of the major problems with WWW resources is the relative impermanence of many sites on the World Wide Web. All too often one encounters the "Error 404 File not found" message. The aim of this site to provide an archive of material on the Marshall Islands. The responsibility for the contents of these pages rests with the respective author. The editor has obtained, where necessary, the permission to reproduce the material. This is gratefully acknowledged. Editorial alterations have been restricted to the visual standardisation to ensure the same 'look and feel' of the site.' All outward links either spawn a new window or have been identified by the pointing hand ( ) symbol.

The main directory pages are designed to be image poor, so that they load faster. The overall lay-out is purposefully designed in a plain fashion in order to avoid 'trendy' lay-out schemes which swiftly show their age. The site places emphasis not on form, but on the quality of the data presented and on the permanency of the data sources. The site is and will remain to be non-commercial and advertising free, which has implications for people who would like to use images and other material hosted on this site (see Copyright and Use of Images).

 
 

 

Site Useage

 
 

The first counter was activated on 17 February 2000, but only measured the frequency with which the portal page was called up. Subsequent counters were placed on second-level pages (eg. culture, history, politics etc). As most search engines target individual pages, and because many users may never access the site portal, these statistics undercount the total site useage.

On 6 September 2001 a new counter was established to measure the total useage of all pages on the site. That counter commenced count at 44,948, which is the sum of useage of all main pages with counters to that date. It is obvious that this figure grossly undercounts the total site useage, but was the only verifiable value available. From 6 September 2001 on, all sub pages have the same counter so that direct visits to lower-order pages contribute to a unified overall site visit count. A comparison between the total site count and the count of the visits to the portal page alone (period October 2001 to August 2002) suggests that less than 10% of the visitors use the portal page at one point of their visit. This ratio (total visits/portal visits = 12.27±2.13) suggests that the total site count on 6 September 2001 would have been closer to 260,000 than the 44,948 used as the starting point of the current total count figure. In essence, 200,000 pages should be added to the figure shown in the counter .

Commencing April 2002 accurate server-level statistics became available. Combined with the fact that the free Netscape hitometer service was discontinued in August, the counter system had to be revised. From November 2002 onwards the pages-delivered counts are presented on a monthly basis, usally updated during the first week of the month. The figure shown comprises of the Netscape hitometer data until March 2002 and the CSU server data from April 2002 onwards (not including the suggested corrections mentioned above).

Rather than counting 'hits', ie system calls to the server which include calls to image files, the statistics presented here only account for 'pages delivered.' The resulting figure is a much more conservative, but more accurate account of actual site useage. The statistics until March 2002 were courtesy of the now defunct free service www.hitometer.com.

 

 

Notes: 1--shift to the whole of site counter; 2--shift to new server
  Total pages
 delivered

until end of

August 2005

4,191,607

Statistics are updated monthly.

 
At the end of 2003 a review was carried out to assess what part of the information provided by The Marshalls Islands--A digital Library and Archive is requested by users. The country of origin of the users, as well as the patterns of use (time and day of week) were also analysed to be better service the community (download PDF).
 
 
 
Number of unique users per month
 
 
 
More detailed accounts are available for the formaer Marshall Islands-only component at the following pages:
Usage Statistics for the Entire Site
Usage Details for the Total Site
        Various data on Type of Browser used, Computer Platform, Screen color depth,
        Screen resolution, Javascript version, Day of the Week, Hourly Breakdown, Site
        Type & Country, Visitor Loyalty and Frequency of Visits.
 
Place of Origin Analysis Australia First Quarter 2003
Place of Origin Analysis USA First Quarter 2003
Total Country of Origin Statistics 2002
Useage Details for the period January to June 2002
Useage Details for the year 2001
Useage Details for the year 2000 (Portal only)
Useage Statistics for the Site Portal only
   
Country of Origin

On record are visitors from the following 173 countries/domains:
Albania (al), American Samoa (as), Andorra (ad), Antigua and Barbuda (ag), Argentina (ar), Armenia (am), Aruba (aw), Ascension Island (ac), Australia (au), Austria (at), Azerbaijan (az), Bahamas (bs), Bangladesh (bd), Belgium (be), Belize (bz), Benin (bj), Bermuda (bm), Bhutan (bt), Bosnia and Herzegovina (ba), Botswana (bw), Brazil (br), Brunei Darussalam (bn), Bulgaria (bg), Byelorussian SSR (by), Cambodia (kh), Canada (ca), Cayman Islands (ky), Chile (cl), China (cn), Christmas Island (cx), Cocos (Keeling) Islands (cc), Colombia (co), Congo, Democratic Republic of the (cd), Cook Islands (ck), Costa Rica (cr), Cote d'Ivoire (ci), Croatia/Hrvatska (hr), Cuba (cu), Cyprus (cy), Czech Republic (cz), Denmark (dk), Dominica (dm), Dominican Republic (do), Ecuador (ec), Egypt (eg), Estonia (ee), Faroe Islands (fo), Fiji (fj), Finland (fi), France (fr), French Polynesia (pf), Georgia (ge), Germany (de), Ghana (gh), Gibraltar (gi), Greece (gr), Greenland (gl), Guam (gu), Guatemala (gt), Guernsey (gg), Guyana (gy), Honduras (hn), HongKong (hk), Hungary (hu), Iceland (is), India (in), Indonesia (id), Iran (Islamic Republic of) (ir), Ireland (ie), Isle of Man (im), Israel (il), Italy (it), Jamaica (jm), Japan (jp), Jersey (je), Jordan (jo), Kazakhstan (kz) , Kenya (ke), Kiribati (ki), Korea, Republic of (kr), Kyrgyzstan (kg), Latvia (lv), Lao People's Democratic Republic (la), Lebanon (lb), Liechtenstein (li), Lithuania (lt), Luxembourg (lu), Macau (mo), Macedonia, Former Yugoslav Republic (mk), Malaysia (my), Maldives (mv), Malta (mt), Marshall Islands (mh), Martinique (mq), Mauritius (mu), Mexico (mx), Micronesia, Federated States of (fm), Moldova, Republic of (md), Montserrat (ms), Morocco (ma), Mozambique (mz), Myanmar (mm), Namibia (na), Nauru (nr), Nepal (np), Netherlands (nl), Netherlands Antilles (an) , New Caledonia (nc), New Zealand (nz), Nicaragua (ni), Niger (ne), Nigeria (ng), Niue (nu), Norfolk Island (nf) , Northern Mariana Islands (mp), Norway (no), Oman (om), Pakistan (pk), Panama (pa), Papua New Guinea (pg), Paraguay (py), Peru (pe), Philippines (ph), Poland (pl), Portugal (pt), Qatar (qa), Romania (ro), Russian Federation (ru), Rwanda (rw), Saint Kitts and Nevis (kn), Saint Lucia (lc), Samoa, Western (ws), Saudi Arabia (sa), Seychelles (sc), Singapore (sg), Slovak Republic (sk), Slovenia (si), Solomon Islands (sb), South Africa (za), Soviet Union, Spain (es), Sri Lanka (lk), Sweden (se), Switzerland (ch), Syrian Arab Republic (sy), Taiwan (tw), Tanzania (tz), Thailand (th), Togo (tg), Tokelau (tk), Tonga (to), Trinidad and Tobago (tt), Turkey (tr), Turks and Caicos Islands (tc), Tuvalu (tv), Ukraine (ua), United Arab Emirates (ae), United Kingdom (gb), United Kingdom (uk), United States (us), Uruguay (uy), US Educational (edu), US Government (gov), US Military (mil), Uzbekistan (uz), Vanuatu (vu), Venezuela (ve), Vietnam (vn), Virgin Islands (USA) (vi), Yemen (ye), Yugoslavia (yu), Zambia (zm), Zimbabwe (zw).
In addition there are users from the domains of Business (biz), Commercial (com), Network (net), Organization (org), International (int) and the like. A substantial percentage of user origins (in excess of 20%) cannot be resolved as the servers are only identified by their numeric IP address. While it is certainly possible to manually identify the location of each server, it is not economical to do so.

 

Countries the users came from to-date (shown in red)
[click here for detail on the Caribbean and Europe].

   
Comparison of Netscape's hitometer and CSU server statistics

Some of the statistics provided by Netscape's hitometer service can be compared to the data from the server logs. A comparison of the count of pages delivered for the period 21 March to 30 June 2002 showed that the hitometer statistics undercount the actual delivery of pages on average by 16.2%. This is caused mainly the fact that all those users will not be counted by Netscape's hitometer system who do not permit cookies to be placed. Another reason of the undercount is that web robots indexing a site will make server calls for the pages, but will not register on the hitometer counter. For the reporting period 21 March to 30 June 2002 the monthly rate of undercount fluctuated between 2.5 and 34.0 percent. In view of the fluctuations on the one hand, and the short analysis period on the other, no attempts were made to adjust the hitometer data. A considerable undercount is certain, however.

 

 

Milestones

 
 

The site started off in 1999 with the publication of three electronic books (Marshallese Legends and Traditions, Tattooing in the Marshall Islands, and Essays on the Marshallese Past). Since then the site has been systematically enlarged by the editor.

 
 

10 October 2005

Site Rebuild Completed, now: 'Digital Micronesia'
 
 

20 September 2005

Portal Page changed to 'Digital Micronesia'
 
 

5 January 2004

Total site count exceeds two million
 
 

23 May 2003

The site has been moved to a new university server physically located in Wagga Wagga, as the old server ('life') in Thurgoona is being discontinued.
 
 

17 January 2003

Total site count exceeds one million
 
 

27 April 2002

Total site count exceeds a quarter million
 
 

15 March 2002

Virtual domain marshall.csu.edu.au established
 
 

7 December 2001

Total site count exceeds 100,000
 
 

6 September 2001

Counter of total site useage established. The counter commenced count at 44,948, which is the sum of all main pages with counters to date. The count for the site portal alone stands at 21, 272.
 
 

18 June 2001

The site has been archived by the National Library of Australia as part of its PANDORA Archive of Australia's Networked Documentary Resources.
 
 

17 February 2000

Invisible web counter set up for the portal page of the site.  
 
 

1 August 1999

Web site established
 
 
 

 

Submissions

 
 

Please contact the editor via e-mail if you feel you have material, text or photos, to contribute to this site. Any submissions are welcome and will be assessed on a case-by-case basis. If material is accepted, it will be formatted to the look-and-feel of the website. Copyright will remain with the author/originator, but 'The Marshall Islands' will be given permanent usage right to the material mounted in the server. No fees will be levied for non commercial use of the material thus posted.

 
 

 

Awards, Recognition and Media

 
 

This website has attracted some media coverage and has received several World Wide Web awards for the excellence of its content and design. These awards are listed on a separate awards page as are links to the media articles.

 
 

 

Journal

 
 

As of May 2004, this website hosts the Micronesian Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences, a journal formerly published by the Northern Marianas College.

 
 

 

Copyright

 
 

All material reproduced on this site is copyrighted to the originators of the material. This applied to both text and images. Except as governed by the provisions of the respective copyright laws of the user's country, nothing may be reproduced without the express permission of the originator or owner of the copyright. Persons wishing to reproduce the material will contact the copyright owner directly or the editor of this website to arrange for contact.

 
 

 

Use of Images

 
 

Use of Images where copyright is owned by Dirk H.R. Spennemann: In general the reproduction of images and text for educational and public interest purposes is encouraged as long as the reproduced amount does not exceed reasonable levels. Where images or text are to be reproduced for such purposes on a non-commercial and advertising free site, a formal acknowledgement line

© Dirk H.R. Spennemann. Reproduced courtesy of Digital Micronesia

with active links to the author's homepage and to the Resources of the Marshall Islands site will suffice. It would be appreciated if the editor will be notified of the reproduction by e-mail.

If the image or text is to be reproduced for a commercial product or on a site that carries advertising either directly or as part of the hosting site, express permission will be required. Contact the editor to discuss the proposal.

 
 

 

Site Index

 
 

All files posted at the site are normally accessed through the structured first level directory pages such as politics, economics, history, culture & society, environment, or literature and through a number of deeper-level overview pages (such as historic images or Information on individual atolls). To provide a different avenue, a list of all files hosted on the site can be accessed from the alphabetical list provided below, as well as from a thematic file index, which is in preparation.

 
List of files on the site
      Alphabetical listing of all files posted at his site

Country Directory
      Listing of pages relevant to specific countries. This provides an alternative entry point to the site.
 
 

 

Update Archive

 
  Select the relevant month if you would like to look at the history of this site. 2000 : April, May, June, July, August, September , October, November, and December

2001 : January to May, June , July, August, September , October , November, and December.

2002 : January, February, March, April, May, June , July, August to October, November, and December.

2003 : January, February, March, April, May,

 
 

 

Acknowledgements

 
 

A site such as this one could obviously not be put together without the help and cooperation of many people.

The site started off in 1999 with the publication of three electronic books (Marshallese Legends and Traditions, Tattooing in the Marshall Islands, and Essays on the Marshallese Past), the raw coding for which was set as class exercises for the subject ITC 130 ' On-Line Publishing'. Fundamental to its success were Prof. David Green and Rob Stocker. Darren Stuart provided some of the further site development and recoding of the students' work into the present form of the three books. The site was originally maintained on the life server of Charles Sturt University. The initial organisational and technical support provided by Prof. David Green and Larry Benton is gratefully recognised. Since then the site has moved to the main server of Charles Sturt University with technical support by Robert Hay.

Since its commencement, the site has been systematically enlarged by the editor. I am particularly indebted to the authors who graciously made their material available, as well as the web administrators who shared lists and data collected by them:

 
 
  Politics
Pages
Mark Gottlieb (Staff Attorney Tobacco Products Liability Project, Tobacco Control Resource Center) Wali M. Osman (Bank of Hawaii, Honolulu); Asian Development Bank; U.S. Department of the Interior, Office of Inspector General; U.S. Bureau of Census; U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Democracy; U.S. Department of State, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs; U.S. General Accounting Office;
 
  Literature Pages Jane Downing (Albury);
 
  Health
Pages
WHO Western Pacific Region
 
  History
Pages
Thomas Duff (Philadelphia, USA ); Francis Hezel (Micronesian Seminar, Pohnpei) Tim Lanzendörfer( XX); Larry Murphy (US National Park Service, Submerged Cultural Resources Unit); Jack Niedenthal (Bikini Local Government , Marshall ISlands); William L. Roberts (Plano, TX); Dave Robison; Steve Trussel; Marimed Foundation
 
 Environment
Pages
Jane Downing (Albury);
 
  Handicraft Pages Anne and Bevan Downing (Canberra); Nancy and David Huskins (Akron, Ohio, USA); Susan King (XXX); Dietgard and Erhart Steffel (Bad Soden, Germany);
 
  Stamp
Pages
Hubert Aichinger (Vienna, Austria); David Benson (Sydney); Kai Bothor (Göttingen, Germany); Bill Claghorn (Benicia, CA, USA); David Crocker (Montagu, South Africa); Lord Denovan (Edinburgh, Scotland); Kevin Doyle (XXX, USA); Richard and Francine Frajola (Ranchos De Taos, USA); Milton Frey (Texas, USA); Fred Gregory (XXX, USA); Michael Hensen (Passau, Germany); Wolfgang Herrmann (Berlin, Germany); Bernd Lüdemann (Lübeck, Germany); Horst Montag (Magdeburg, Germany); Vera Petty (Warwick, Bermuda); Michael Schmiedl (Frankfurt, Germany); Christof Schmidt (Hilden, Germany); Gillian Simpson (Librarian), Australian Maritime Museum, Sydney); A Lavar Taylor (Santa Ana, CA, USA); Charles L. Williams (Joplin, MO, USA);
 
  

 

 
  
 
The Micronesia--An Electronic Library & Archive of Primary Sources is provided free of charge as an advertising-free information service for the world community. It is being maintained by Dirk HR Spennemann, Associate Professor in Cultural Heritage Management, Institute of Land, Water and Society and School of Environmental & Information Sciences, Charles Sturt University, Albury, Australia. The server space and technical support are provided by Charles Sturt University as part of its commitment to regional engagement.

CONTACT:
Dirk H.R. Spennemann, Institute of Land, Water and Society, Charles Sturt University, P.O.Box 789, Albury NSW 2640, Australia.
e-mail: dspennemann@csu.edu.au

© (site and concept)
Dirk Spennemann 1999– 2005