This paper reports the results of a research project, sponsored by Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico - in order to develop an evaluation methodology for emerging Brazilian e-journals on Science and Technology. The proposed methodology intends to be an alternative for the impact factor used by the Institute for Scientific Information, and is based on the quantitative and qualitative analysis of the links to the e-journal website, obtained by submitting its URL to the Google search engine. The methodology considers not only the number of links directed to the website, but also the existence of qualitative links: websites which are considered an "authority"on specific knowledge areas, and those of non-Brazilian institutions. These different kinds of links were weighted and used to calculate a grade to an e-journal site, as an indicator of its relevance in a certain knowledge area. The results obtained were validated by specialists in different knowledge areas.
scientific communication; electronic publishing; electronic journals; links; evaluation; Brazil