User:NicoleFipps/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: Thelyphonida
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate: I wanted to learn a little more about the whip scorpion.  After going over it in class, it become a subject of interest for me

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic? Yes
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections? No, not really
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article? No
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed? It is concise, but I don't think it really has enough detail.

Lead evaluation
It definitely could have been more well done, but it did adequately introduce the whip scorpion.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic? Yes
 * Is the content up-to-date? I am going to say yes, but there were some sources that were from the 1800s, so I would definitely look into that before I used it as a reliable source
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong? The article definitely seems like it is lacking information, but since I don't know a lot about whip scorpions I don't know exactly what is it that is missing.

Content evaluation
It definitely seems to be slightly lacking in content.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


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

Tone and balance evaluation
I do think that the tone is neutral and it is a balanced position, but under habitat, the writer uses the word probably, which just makes me think that he/she didn't bother looking for information regarding what they were talking about and instead made assumptions, which is not what wikipedia is about.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Sources and references evaluation
For the sources, our of 14 sources, 8 were from the 2000s and only 4 were after 2010. This does make me question the reliability and accuracy of the sources cited in this wikipedia article. The content is already severely lacking, so maybe it is just that there isn't a lot known about the whip scorpion, but it seems to me like the person just didn't do their research or didn't pick proper sources to support the facts represented.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Organization evaluation
The article is organized well and very concise, but severely lacking in detail. I didn't notice any major spelling or grammatical errors.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic? yes
 * Are images well-captioned? not really
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations? I think so
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way? eh, could be better

Images and media evaluation
There are only images of the whip scorpion itself. The captions don't give much detail as to why each picture is important. There could have been pictures of its habitat or something, but since there's not I feel like the author missed out on an opportunity to make the article more visually appealing.

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?

Talk page evaluation
There has not been a lot of discussion around this article, but the comments that have been left include taking paragraphs out for plagarism, using british-english spelling of words, and adding IPA for words that look difficult to pronounce. These conversations however do not have many replies and range from 2006-2019, which makes me think the page definitely hasn't been tampered with much. This article in particular is part of the WikiProjects Anthropods.

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
I think that the article is well organized and concise, but lacks in detail all around. On the talk page, it seemed that many people were confused in some parts where there wasn't much detail. I think that more research should be done on the subject of whip scorpions so that the information currently presented in the article can be expanded upon using more recent sources. Thus, I would consider this article underdeveloped.