User:Gobears15/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article
This is where you will complete your article evaluation. Please use the template below to evaluate your selected article.


 * Name of article: Deepwater Horizon oil spill
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate.

I choose this article to evaluate because it is closely related to my group's theme of #saveouroceans because oil spills from large corporations are major disasters that greatly affect marine life across the world.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic? Yes, as well as cites potential other pages.
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections? Yes, while providing an overview of the causes and aftermath of the spill.
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article? Not really.
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed? Might be slightly overly detailed.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic? Absolutely, it provides the content in a well organized manner.
 * Is the content up-to-date? Yes, it has the latest information on the court rulings that occurred 5 years after the original spill.
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong? The reactions section seems irrelevant/not necessary.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article neutral? For the most part yes, just uses facts to state information without using flowery language to persuade the reader in one direction.
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position? All of the estimates as to how impactful the spill was on the environment seem to be very high but they have cited reputed resources at the bottom of the page.
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented? I don't think so.
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another? Not really, it just seems to present the facts in an unbiased manner.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information? Yes, there are hyperlinks to specific quotes and proper citations.
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic? There are a multitude of sources from a wide range of volumes and mediums.
 * Are the sources current? Some are more current than others but there doesn't seem to be any outdated sources.
 * Check a few links. Do they work? Yes, all of the links I tried worked.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read? A little dense to read for the most part pretty easy to read.
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors? Not that I noticed.
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic? Yes the breakdown of the different sections makes it very easy to find a certain part of the topic and go more in depth.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * 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

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Overall evaluation
Overall, this article did an excellent job at presenting a multitude of facts on the deepwater horizon oil spill and the various sub topics of it such as the environmental impact, legal consequences, and public response/opinion. It takes a tone that is for the most part unbiased and easy to read although at times the information seemed very dense and hard to read. One potential improve I believe could be made is that some of the scientific predictions that were made in the article seemed to be loosely backed by scientific reasoning. Either these predictions should be updated with current research as citations or they should be removed to detract from overstating the environmental impact and potentially creating a tone that seems biased. Is there any information on the effect on the workers and their viewpoint to create a more well-balanced article?

Optional activity

 * Choose at least 1 question relevant to the article you're evaluating and leave your evaluation on the article's Talk page. Be sure to sign your feedback

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 * Link to feedback: Talk:Deepwater Horizon oil spill