User:Sidhu-jas98/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article
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 * Name of article: Doordarshan
 * I was captivated by the in-class discussion on Indian TV and its relationship to Indian politics and culture. I wanted to explore Doordarshan a bit more because I found it interesting how India only had one available TV channel for several years. My primary motivation for looking into Doordarshan in the context of this article was to do some research on how it has evolved since its inception.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?

Doordarshan (abbreviated in English as DD) is an autonomous public service broadcaster founded by the Government of India, owned by the Broadcasting Ministry of India and one of Prasar Bharati's two divisions. The introductory sentence, reproduced above, does a sufficient but not amazing job at describing the article's topic. It would be better to include some words that describe the content provided by Doordarshan channels.


 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?

One of India's largest broadcasting organisations in studio and transmitter infrastructure, it was established on 15 September 1959. Doordarshan, which also broadcasts on digital terrestrial transmitters, provides television, radio, online and mobile service throughout metropolitan and regional India and overseas through the Indian Network and Radio India. The article's major sections are History, Channels, Channel list, International broadcasting, Criticism, See also, References and External links. The Lead (sentences 2 and 3 reproduced above) includes a brief description of Doordarshan's history (its founding date) and its international broadcasts ("regional India and overseas"). It does not, however, provide the amount of channels or any information on what types of channels are available on the network. Additionally, there is no reference to criticism of the service.


 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article?
 * The article contains no mentions of Indian Network or Radio India, both of which are present in the Lead. The Lead also refers to an online arm of Doordarshan, but this is nowhere to be found in the article.
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed?
 * The Lead is concise, but maybe overly so. It fails to give an adequate background of Doordarshan to someone who would just look up the page to read the Lead.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
 * Yes, all of the content in the article is relevant to the main topic. However, the content is not fully representative of the topic. There is no information on the old viewership numbers or the cultural impact of the original singular channel.
 * Is the content up-to-date?
 * This page was last edited on 1 October 2019. The most recent references are from February and March 2019, indicating that the article's content has the most up-to-date information available.
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?
 * As I mentioned above, there is no content that indicates the cultural impact or scope of the viewership of Doordarshan from its inception through today. There is also no mention of internet service, Indian Network or Radio India, which are all referred to in the Lead.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article neutral?
 * Yes, the article seems to be politically and ethically neutral. Within the Criticism section, it uses facts and reports instead of personal conjecture to paint the picture of Doordarshan-related controversies.
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * No, although the Criticism section focuses on anti-Hindu nationalist and anti-government sentiments directed at Doordarshan, this makes sense because it is indeed a government-run agency.
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
 * Pro-Doordarshan viewpoints (its benefits to the public, etc.) are underrepresented. Nothing is really overrepresented in this article.
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?
 * It doesn't seem like the article is trying to persuade the reader toward or away from any specific position. However, it does feel like the article treats Doordarshan as an afterthought.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
 * Most of the facts in the article are backed up by news articles from prominent Indian newspapers such as The Asian Age, The Times of India, The Indian Express and The Financial Express. I am assuming that these sites are thoroughly fact-checked which leads me to believe that the Wikipedia article's facts are indeed reliable.
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
 * The sources, while plentiful in amount, do not seem to be totally thorough. They moreso contain factoids, op-eds or analysis about Doordarshan rather than informational literature.
 * Are the sources current?
 * Yes, the sources are current as of early 2019.
 * Check a few links. Do they work?
 * The vast majority (all barring one) of the several links I checked did indeed work.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
 * The article seems to be concise and clear. Some paragraphs could be broken up as to separate factual info to make it more digestible.
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
 * The article seems to have been written in Indian English, with words like "organisation" appearing in lieu of "organization" and "colour" instead of "color." Additionally, some grammar seems to be off relative to the standard of American English. One specific example of this is "These channels are relayed by all terrestrial transmitters in India" under the Channels section.
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?
 * The article is well-organized and appropriately broken up into the sections History, Channels, Channel list, International broadcasting, Criticism, See also, References and External links.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
 * Only two images appear on the article: the Doordarshan logo and a photo of its New Delhi headquarters.
 * Are images well-captioned?
 * The logo contains no caption at all, which is sorely needed because it contains Hindi text. The headquarters image has a sufficient caption but could be made clearer.
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
 * Yes, according to the image information pages, the images do adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations.
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?
 * The images are not very visually appealing —more logos could be used for different sub-divisions of Doordarshan, and a better picture could have been used for Doordarshan Bhawan.

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * There are conversations happening regarding citations for the article, naming conventions, whether the article ought to be merged and so on.
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?

Doordarshan has been listed as a level-5 vital article in Society....This article has been rated as Start-Class. This article is within the scope of WikiProject India / Television and of WikiProject Media.


 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?
 * In class, we applied more an analytic lens to Doordarshan; here the article uses an informative lens.

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions


 * What is the article's overall status?
 * The article's overall status is that it is a good start but needs more work to be fully fleshed out.
 * What are the article's strengths?
 * The article's strengths are its strong resources and its availability of easy-to-read information.
 * How can the article be improved?
 * The article can be improved by adding more information and clearing up some misconceptions/misspellings/inconsistencies.
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?
 * The article is underdeveloped but not poorly developed.

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:Doordarshan