User:Olsen-in-HD/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: (link)
 * Rickettsia
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate.
 * I chose this article because I was not familiar with the subject material and wanted to learn about it.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed?

Lead evaluation
The Lead includes an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic. The first sentence of the Lead describes what the topic is and notes some the genus's unique characteristics. While the Lead includes a brief description of most of the article's major sections, it does so in an indirect way. Moreover, the Lead fails to adequately introduce the "Genomics" section of the article. To elaborate, the closest the Lead gets to touching on the subsection is mentioning replication.

The Lead also includes information that is not present in the article. The information presented in the first sentence of the Lead does not show up anywhere else in the article. The Lead also explains the difference between rickettsia and rickets (which also is not seen in the article). Additionally, it details that chicken embryos are used to culture the genus (this detail is not provided in the article).

The Lead is also overly detailed. To elaborate, the Lead describes what the disease called rickets is and what it is caused from. It would likely have been better to simply state that it is not the same thing as the topic and provide a hyperlink to the other topic. Furthermore, I do not think that the words "usually not capitalized" should be included. This is because it is extraneous information that causes the sentence it is in to be convoluted. If the writer wanted the information to be stressed, they should have just made another sentence.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Content evaluation
Upon reading through the article, the content all seems to pertain to the topic. However, I am not sure that the content is up-to-date. To elaborate, the majority of the sources used to create the article are over ten years old. While there are a few sources that have been published in the last five years, they are few in number. It follows that the article may need to be corroborated with current research in order to ensure its accuracy.

Furthermore, the pathophysiology section of the article is fairly general and lacking in explicit detail. If known, it would be helpful to include the mechanisms than enable the genus to invade vascular endothelial cells cause damage. On a positive note, the only content in the article that seems to be out of place is the description of the disease called rickets.

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
The article appears to be neutral in its tone. The information is presented in a way that seems unbiased towards any particular position. Moreover, the nature of the article helps to ensure that viewpoints are not over or underrepresented. There is no persuasion used in the article, it merely is conveying facts about the genus.

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
There are many facts in the article that are not backed up by a secondary source of information. To explain, the entire first paragraph of the Lead lacks a reference. In this paragraph, important characteristics of the genus are listed (such as cellular structure). Since much of this information does not show up anywhere else in the article, an explicit citation is needed.

While many of the sources used are thorough in their explanation of a specific aspect of the bacterial genus, some of the links to the sources do not work at all. This fact makes it hard for a Wikipedia user to verify that information is accurate. As stated before, many of the articles are over ten years old. This calls into question the relevance and accuracy of the information included on the article page.

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
While the article is well-organized, it is hard to understand in places. The hardest part of the article to understand is the beginning of the second paragraph of the Lead. The sentence contains two nonessential interjections in close proximity. This can cause a reader to forget what the sentence is even about. The article also contains a fair amount of grammatical errors. One of them annoyed me so much that I edited the article. The grammatical error that I am referring to pertains to the listing of the dimensions of the different cell shapes of the genus. The article previously would list the sizes associated with specific shapes without using any punctuation to indicate that the information was not part of the main idea of the sentence. Conversely, I found the majority of the Genomics section to be very well written.

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?

Images and media evaluation
The article contains two images. One is an imaged of stained cell that is infested with rickettsia and the other is a cladogram to help readers better understand the classification of the genus and its subcategories. While the images are captioned adequately, one of them does not have a proper citation and may violate Wikipedia's copyright regulations. The image referred to is the one depicting the stained cell. Additionally, the images are laid out in a generally appealing way. While I do think that the cladogram is not very pleasing to look at, I recognize that it was likely created by a fellow editor (due to the extensive amount of hyperlinks and general look of the figure). This fact makes me more forgiving of its appearance.

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
The article seems to have gone through a fair amount of changes, specifically around the mid-2000s. Most of these discussions relate to increasing the clarity of the article and updating sources. However, name calling occurred in one of the discussions. One editor asked if the article could be updated with the name of a leading authority on one of the diseases associated with the genus. Another inquired why and the original editor called them an idiot. The information was left out because it was deemed to be "superfluous."

The article has been rated as C-Class and is part of the Microbiology WikiProject. Wikipedia discusses this topic in a way that is much more collaborative than how we talk about it in class. While in class only the professor is intimately familiar with the topic, the editors of Wikipedia all contribute pieces of information that they are familiar with. It is important to note though that some of the conversations indicate that not all of the article authors were intimately familiar with the topic.

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
The article is mostly an undeveloped collection of facts. While some of the sections are strong and developed well (genomics), others are very weak (pathophysiology). In regards to status, the article is C-Class in quality and of Mid-importance. It is sufficient to say that this article is still a work in progress. I think that the article is strong in that it contains a wide variety of information. The problem is that some of the article sections have hardly any depth. I would try to improve the article first by verifying source information and relevancy. From there I would work on the various grammatical errors of the article and rewrite it so that it does not feel as disjointed. Finally, I would try to flesh-out the sections that are lacking (such as pathophysiology).

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

with four tildes — ~


 * Link to feedback:
 * Talk:Rickettsia