User:Lauraellis4/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article

Complete your article evaluation below. Here are the key aspects to consider:

Lead section

A good lead section defines the topic and provides a concise overview. A reader who just wants to identify the topic can read the first sentence. A reader who wants a very brief overview of the most important things about it can read the first paragraph. A reader who wants a quick overview can read the whole lead section.

Does the lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?
Does the lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?
Does the lead include information that is not present in the article? (It shouldn't.)
Is the lead concise or is it overly detailed?

Content

A good Wikipedia article should cover all the important aspects of a topic, without putting too much weight on one part while neglecting another.

Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
Is the content up-to-date?
Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?
Does the article deal with one of Wikipedia's equity gaps? Does it address topics related to historically underrepresented populations or topics?

Tone and Balance

Wikipedia articles should be written from a neutral point of view; if there are substantial differences of interpretation or controversies among published, reliable sources, those views should be described as fairly as possible.

Is the article neutral?
Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
Are minority or fringe viewpoints accurately described as such?
Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?

Sources and References

A Wikipedia article should be based on the best sources available for the topic at hand. When possible, this means academic and peer-reviewed publications or scholarly books.

Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
Are the sources current?
Are the sources written by a diverse spectrum of authors? Do they include historically marginalized individuals where possible?
Are there better sources available, such as peer-reviewed articles in place of news coverage or random websites? (You may need to do some digging to answer this.)
Check a few links. Do they work?

Organization and writing quality

The writing should be clear and professional, the content should be organized sensibly into sections.

Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?

Images and Media

Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
Are images well-captioned?
Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?

Talk page discussion

The article's talk page — and any discussions among other Wikipedia editors that have been taking place there — can be a useful window into the state of an article, and might help you focus on important aspects that you didn't think of.

What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?

Overall impressions

What is the article's overall status?
What are the article's strengths?
How can the article be improved?
How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?

Examples of good feedback

A good article evaluation can take a number of forms. The most essential things are to clearly identify the biggest shortcomings, and provide specific guidance on how the article can be improved.

Peer review of this article about a famous painting

Which article are you evaluating?

Giraffe

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?

I didn't want to start one websites for our project yet so I picked Giraffes because they're my favorite animals! My first impression was that it was a very developed page, especially compared to some of the deep sea organisms I had looked at recently. I loved all the visuals and how it was broken up.

Evaluate the article

Lead section - Clearly described in the introductory sentence and had good information. It didn't really preview the sections below but it had relevant information despite being a bit lengthy.

Content - It seems fairly up to date; the last dated information was from 2019 but I'm not sure if more conversation status information has come out since then to use. It has lots of relevant information but does not talk about one of Wikipedia's equity gaps since I don't think that's relevant to the topic.

Tone and Balance - I didn't pick up on any biases in the article. Most was just describing facts and then towards the end it added in cultural significance to humans, conversation status and human exploitation and captivity but it was all based in fact and not arguing to stop or continue.

Sources and References - There are recent sources from 2022 and 2021 as well as many older sources from the late 1900s. The links did work for me and there were a variety of authors listed. There were some repeat authors but still enough diversity in sources, since there were 146 sources listed.

Organization and writing quality - I really liked the writing and organization of the article and how it started broad and went into technical more specific sections like body parts and its evolutionary history. I do feel like the conservation status could be more important rather than the last section in the article but I'm sure it's one of the newer sections that gets edited frequently while the above sections have more direct relevance to what giraffes are and where they came from.

Images and media - There's a great use of images that adds to the content being discussed and all have captions to support what they are showing and contributing.

Talk page discussion - It is rated as a level 4 article and there are some good, recent conversations happening in reference to it. One is talking about adding a mythology section while there others are discussing improvements to information already posted. It seems they concluded their conversations by fixing the mistakes and they are updated now on the page.

Overall impressions - Overall, this seems like a very well developed article and I hope we are able to get our deep-sea organisms closer to this level. It is strong in that there are a lot of different relevant sections that go in depth, while citing where every piece of information comes from. I think it is pretty complete and well-developed. However, an area that could be improved would be to get a more recent update on the conservation status since maybe something has changed since 2019 and that's one of the few things that would need to keep being updated on this page.