Lately, sites have appeared on the "Armenian Web" that call themselves portals. It is pointless to compare them with big Internet portals (Yahoo!, AltaVista, and others) but it is not pointless to examine the Armenian portals, comparing them with each other, in the context of their creation and development. This will allow us, at least as a first approximation, to describe what is called a portal in Armenia, and to do a small comparative analysis. I will base my study on interviews that Mane Manukyan conducted with representatives of four portals (www.abide.am, www.port.am, www.gateway.am, www.siliconarmenia.am), and on an ARKA agency interview with the executive director of www.webnet.am. Though not exhaustive, this list of portals is sufficient for our purposes. The group can be conditionally divided into two subgroups - portals originating out of purely local means (or even without means) and initiative, and portals that were created with financing from international organizations for specific purposes. The former were first set up as Internet pages and gradually evolved into "portals". The latter were designed from the beginning not as multi-purpose portals, but as portals with specific tasks, although they have undergone changes over time.

The second group - Gateway, SiliconArmenia - is more concerned with problems outside the Internet (even if these problems are related to the development of high- or information technology), although they may contribute to the cooperation among portals, creation of new services, establishment of communities, etc. That is to say, they are less representative of the current state of development of the Armenian Web. Thus, we will focus more on the first group-its achievements, characteristics, and problems.

www.abide.am offers specific services - music, and photographic competitions and awards, which, the portal's manager maintains, enjoy wide popularity. One of its main goals is to organize e-commerce, to have an e-shop, despite the fact that the banking system of Armenia is not conducive to this.

www.port.am has a functioning business department, which its managers say is the best in Armenia. They are, however, compelled to acknowledge that portals in Armenia cannot be commercial yet-they cannot be a source of financial profit.

www.webnet.am presents itself as the first business portal in three languages, where anyone can place a link, after making the necessary payment. It hopes to overcome the doubt on the part of Armenian businesspeople that it is possible to establish business relations through the Internet. Naturally, it tries to offer as many services as possible, so it must establish relations with other Internet sites (for example, news agencies), or otherwise cooperate with them.

If we judge these portals by the principle of "free services and paid advertisement" (which, in fact, is the main principle behind the operation of portals), we may conclude that the possibilities for commercial activity are minimal - there is no reason to advertise on the Armenian Web, thus there is no competition among the portals, either. Thus far, the portals manage with presenting Armenian companies to the world.

I will not discuss the statistical data - the quality of services, the geography of visits, the numbers of registered organizations, the "resources", or the "hits"-since more comprehensive research will be needed to draw conclusions from such information.

Thus, the practical significance of the portals on the "Armenian web" is strictly limited. Their symbolic function has been expressed more clearly by a representative of Port.am: "For us, www.port.am is not a source of finance, it is our image."

Problems

According to unanimous opinion, the main problem is ArmenTel-its "high prices and low quality", but there are other problems, too. One of them is the lack of specialists, which is another factor that negatively affects development. The banking system (which makes online commerce impossible), Internet service providers (which don't provide certain services), and many other problems of an economic or social nature are mentioned as hindrances as well. Among the difficulties is maintaining a portal in three languages, which is, many people insist, a very challenging task (the hardest part, as you may guess, is maintaining the portal in Armenian).

As the first interaction with Armenian businesses, the main way that portals assist Armenian companies is by presenting them to the world through the Internet. The ambition to be a portal leads them to introduce newly created Armenian Websites.

The following circumstances are closely interlinked: there are no advertisements, or they are very primitive. Thus, there is no competition among the portals. Added to this is the inability of the banking system to promote e-commerce. All of this demonstrates that the connection between Armenian businesses and the Internet is weak or absent.

Some conclusions

It can be said right away that the two principal features of portals - origination and function - do not characterize Armenian portals. Armenian portals (Abide, Webnet, Port) originated from simple web pages. Not only were they not search engines (like Yahoo!, AltaVista, and other portals), but they still in essence lack an appropriate search capacity (especially where texts in Armenian are concerned). At the same time, they are either not commercial, or are commercial to an insignificant degree. Of course, this is one of the main problems that concern them - how to persuade Armenian businesspeople that the Internet can be a means for business, how to make their pages attractive to advertisers, etc.

The portals, whatever they are, characterize the current state of the Armenian Web, and point out a number of important problems. The time for the self-development of the Internet has passed, and the present state of making no headway, and the lack of qualitative change, are the consequences of the absence of an appropriate national strategy. One of the principal reasons for the weak interaction between the Internet and business organizations is that there is no proper state policy.

Another important element - the indifference of the information technology industry of Armenia toward local Internet needs - has the same cause. We have mentioned that maintaining a portal in the Armenian language is a very difficult task. The Armenian versions, if they exist, are very poor in content. But first and foremost, they are not supported by the necessary technologies. There is, for example, no possibility to conduct the simplest search. By whom and how should this and other programs, without which the Armenian language content on the Internet will remain doubtful at best, be created?

Probably the development of portals will slowly start to move forward, and online commerce will perhaps become a reality one day, but in conclusion, we must note that the current situation is extremely worrying, especially from the standpoint of Internet prospects for Armenian culture.