User:Swhittemore/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.


 * Market failure: (link)
 * I have chosen to evaluate this article because market failures is an integral topic in public economics and it seems to be a good place to understand the fundamentals and basics of a wikipedia structure.

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 introductory sentence of the Lead is concise and gives a good breakdown of the article's topic. While the Lead does a good job breaking down what a market failure is, it does not give a description of the major sections of the rest of the article. The Lead includes only information that is presented again later in the article. I believe the Lead for this specific article could have been made more concise and it contains information that is not relevant to the article. For example, the inclusion of the description of ecological market failures I believe is a topic for another article.

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
While my knowledge of the topic is limited the content, links, and references appear up-to-date. Furthermore, the content of the article does a good job of staying related to the main topic. All the content present in the article strengthen my knowledge of market failure. However, I find myself questioning whether the section on ecological market failure warranted being a part of its own article rather than being included in the market failure article.

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 comes across as neutral and does not favor any particular view or position. All claims that were made by the article were either backed up by sufficient references and evidence or provided with equal support to other viewpoints. My judgement causes me to believe that the viewpoints represented in the article are all presented in a balanced fashion with no particular viewpoint being represented excessively or minimally. I believe no viewpoints or positions are favored anymore or less than the other positions. All the viewpoints seem to be presented for the sake of knowledge rather than as a way to favor any one in particular.

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
The facts that I checked and examined were all reliable and backed up by a reliable source of information as well. While I believe the sources leave out relevant literature on the topic of market failure there is a good amount of information represented within the sources. The sources are current when current sources are relevant. Some sources are quite old but those sources are covering topics such as Marx and Milton Friedman which are older individuals and topics. All the links that I checked work.

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 effectively with easy to read writing and efficient structure. The article did not have any grammatical errors or spelling errors. I believe the structure of the article is done well and delivers the relevant topics and information well.

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
There is a lack of images in the article. I recognize that market failure might be hard to find images for but I believe the article could be supplemented by images of graphs. However, the included images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations and are well captioned.

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
Most of the conversations on the article focus on whether certain information in the article is necessary. The article is C-rated and is part of the Economics WikiProject. The way this article is discussed on Wikipedia is related more to whether information is relevant while the way we talk about the topic in class is more related to information related to theory of 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 overall missing information but I simply don't know enough about the topic to point out which areas it is lacking in. The articles's strengths lie in the fact that the information that is presented is done very effectively. I believe the article could be improved in its use of images and visual representations of the topic to help readers understand the more complex topics more easily. The article is well developed but according to its C-rating could use some more information to fill certain gaps.

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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