Wikipedia:United States Education Program/Courses/Cyberlaw (Brian Carver)/Articles

Potential Articles To Work On
This table will list each article that a student is working on, and which other students will be peer reviewers for the article.

Your Articles's Outline

 * If you are summarizing a case, the outline used by the Wikiproject on Supreme Court cases is a good overall structure to start from for summarizing any case, whether it was decided by the Supreme Court or not.

References generally
Wikipedia articles need to be referenced using reliable sources, to ensure verifiability. Even if you don't follow every guideline (here or elsewhere), the most important consideration is to cite your sources somehow. More advanced discussion of referencing code can be found at Help:Footnotes.

Wikipedia references inspire strong opinions. Users have created several referencing styles, and have often strategically seeded the documentation to refer to one style or another, to the exclusion of alternatives. Attempts at top-down standardization have not been successful, and there is substantial disagreement about the relative merits of various styles with respect to features (e.g. extraction of metadata), readability (e.g. on various screen sizes), compatibility (e.g. among Internet browsers, especially old ones), accessibility (e.g. for screen readers for the blind) and other things.

With this in mind, this is not the only "right" way to do references, but you may nevertheless find it more convenient than alternatives.

To reference a fact in Wikipedia, create an entry in the reference list (once), and a series of inline references (whenever that resource is cited). This process is standardized with several templates and markup tags.

A good citation to Baker v. Selden, a United States Supreme Court case, will appear in the reference list as:

I made that reference with the following code: Note that some fields in the Cite court template can be left blank if you don't have certain information. If you believe that some fields aren't relevant at all, just omit them completely.

In the text of the article, the inline reference will appear as a superscripted, bracketed, numbered hyperlink:
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

You should name your references with a unique identifier in HTML-like format:, and fill in the contents. Thereafter, references identified as  will not need to have all the citation information filled in. Though you can create these inline references with  tags, it is simpler to use the R template, like. (This is especially concise when citing several items together: .) Choose the identifiers based on the source. Choose the order of the citations in order of relevance to the text (or alphabetically when there's no preference).

The inline reference used above was created with this code: Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

While you will frequently find the  tags embedded in the middle of a page's code (at the point where the reference is made), it is frequently less confusing to use "list-defined references", which collects all of the filled-in references together in a single list at the end of a page, in the References section. For example: ==References==

As you saw before (with the Baker case example), there are templates that help you fill out references in a standard way. Cite court and Citation are good ones to use. You aren't obligated to use these templates, but they will generally simplify your task of formatting references consistently. They also improve articles by making them substantially easier to parse with automated tools.

Facts and sources
Wikipedia distinguishes between citing a fact contained in a judicial opinion, and mentioning the case itself. If you're referring to a fact, definitely cite the case using a standard format as above so that it appears as a reference in the article's reference list. If you're just indicating the existence of another case, wikilink to its article (or to what the article might be called, if the article doesn't yet exist).

Finally, remember that when referencing a judicial opinion, you're citing a primary source with respect to the decision, and a secondary source with respect to the facts of the case. WP:PSTS documents Wikipedia policy for properly dealing with sources. In particular: "Do not analyze, synthesize, interpret, or evaluate material found in a primary source yourself; instead, refer to reliable secondary sources that do so."

Cases
To the extent possible, provide links to publicly-available versions of all court opinions mentioned. Good sources of Federal opinions are http://bulk.resource.org/courts.gov/c/ and http://courtlistener.com

Statutes
How to cite to the United States Code (U.S.C.)

Links
In general, provide links to other articles of relevance within Wikipedia. You can do this within an article by enclosing the link target's title in two sets of square brackets. For example, wikilink is generated with.

Use the See also and External links sections of articles to contain standalone links. With few exceptions, external links are generally avoided in the main body of an article; instead, they are contained in the References and External links sections.

Categorization and orphaned pages
Choose a Category/Categories for the page you edit

One of the following categories might fit the page you edit: or look for a better category in the Category tree.
 * Category:United States Internet case law
 * Category:United States copyright case law
 * Category:United States federal intellectual property legislation
 * Category:United States Supreme Court cases
 * Category:United States courts of appeals cases
 * Category:United States district court cases
 * Category:California state case law

Don't let the page you edit be an orphan

Click the "What links here" link in the toolbox on the left-hand margin of the page you edit and make sure it has at least three incoming links (from pages other than this one) and think about what other pages in Wikipedia ought to link to the page you edit and then add such links.

Infobox templates
Some articles, particularly case summaries, have an Infobox on the right-hand side, providing key details of the case. If you would like to use such an Infobox, here are some that may be of use: Other Infoboxes are topical rather than court-specific. You can see a list of some of these at the WikiProject Law page.
 * Template:Infobox SCOTUS case Infobox for Supreme Court of the United States cases.
 * Template:Infobox Court Case Infobox for U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cases and international cases. This template should automatically choose the correct image of the Court's seal from Template:Infobox Court Case/images. You can also use this template for state court cases but you won't get an image unless you add it.
 * Template:Infobox United States District Court Case Template to create an Infobox for U.S. District court cases. This template should automatically choose the correct image of the Court's seal from Template:Infobox United States District Court Case/images.
 * Template:Infobox High Court Template to create an Infobox for state Supreme Court cases.
 * Template:Infobox California Supreme Court case Infobox for California Supreme Court cases.

Wikipedia policies
As you work on your Wikipedia project, you should keep in mind the Wikipedia policies we've discussed. Being aware of what the Wikipedia community expects both in terms of content and technically will help you to avoid mistakes. BE SURE TO DO THIS.

If you want to be particularly conscious of formatting and style, follow the guidelines from the Wikipedia manual of style.

Brian's 15-point Wikipedia Project Checklist a.k.a. HOW TO SUCCEED AT YOUR WIKI PROJECT

 * Use this checklist not only in the initial writing of an article, but also as a first reviewer of a classmate's contribution.

I will likely review projects with something like the following checklist in mind. This list is based in part on Wikipedia's The perfect article, which you might also want to read, although, don't worry, I'm not expecting "perfect" articles.

Some of the following will only apply to those working on entire pages. Re-interpret or disregard where you have a more narrowly-focused project. In no particular order:


 * 1) Does the contribution appear to be cut and paste from an existing source without appropriate citation? [Nothing will make me less pleased. Don't do this.]
 * 2) Does the lead section provide a stand-alone concise summary of the article?  See: Lead section and for an even more thorough treatment see: Guide to writing better articles.
 * 3) Is field-specific jargon avoided where possible and explained where necessary? I.e., is the general lay audience of an encyclopedia adequately kept in mind?
 * 4) Are wikilinks, i.e., links to other Wikipedia articles, provided where appropriate?
 * 5) Is the page edited an orphan?  See "What links here" in the Toolbox on the left margin. If so, find relevant articles elsewhere and create wikilinks to the page you are editing.
 * 6) Does the contribution maintain a neutral point of view, consist of verifiable statements, and avoid becoming original research/opinion?
 * 7) Are facts cited from reputable sources, preferably sources that are accessible and up-to-date? Are additional references for further reading provided?
 * 8) Is the contribution clear; written to avoid ambiguity and misunderstanding, using logical structure, and plain clear prose; free of redundant language?
 * 9) Correct grammar, verb tenses, and spelling? Common mistake: multiple verb tenses throughout article. Most of the topics of these articles describe past events, so use past tense consistently throughout. "The plaintiff argued...The defendant responded...The court decided..." NOT The Plaintif argues...The defendant responds...The court decides..."
 * 10) Is the page categorized appropriately?
 * 11) In general are the reasons why the article topic is notable made clear, providing enough detail on important aspects, without providing too much detail on minor points?
 * 12) Are links provided to publicly-available versions of all primary sources, such as court opinions? Are citations done properly?
 * 13) Are references formatted properly? See technical guidelines on our project page where it explains: Subsequent references to the same source then just need  and see generally Referencing for beginners.
 * 14) Is there an Infobox Template that could be used on this page? Read the summary of these on our WikiProject page. For example, there are separate templates for District Court cases, Circuit Court Cases, and for various legal topics. Ask if you are unsure what sort of Infobox is most appropriate.
 * 15) Is the "educational assignment" template included on the article's discussion page?

Brian's Guidelines for Second Reviewers (Peer Review)

 * Use the following checklist as a second reviewer of a classmate's contribution.


 * 1) You should expect to spend as much time on a second review as you did on writing your initial article. Do a thorough, substantive, edit. Nothing is off limits. You can do a total re-write if it's needed.
 * 2) Cite-check every reference in the article. That means, look at each reference and confirm that it supports the point that the article cites it for.
 * 3) Try to find additional relevant sources not already cited and add them to the article.
 * 4) Make sure that the citations are formatted in a consistent manner and that none of them are simply a bare URL.
 * 5) Once you are familiar with the subject matter of the article, try to think of a relevant aspect of the topic that is not covered at all or not covered enough and add that information to the article, with sources.
 * 6) Think carefully about whether the article makes its notability obvious and if necessary, add a discussion of critical scholarship, commentary, or reactions on the subject of the article.
 * 7) If some aspect of the article could be better illustrated by adding an image (cc-licensed or public domain and available from Wikimedia Commons) then add such images with suitable captions.
 * 8) If after thorough review and attempts to find additional sources, images, etc. you still believe that the article is essentially perfect as is and that you could not even make 10 edits to improve the article, then review the Good article criteria and the Guide for nominating good articles and then nominate the article for Good article status. Then, instead of editing this masterpiece, participate in the review of another article in the Good article nomination process within the same subject category where you listed your classmate's article.

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