This story leaves out two factors that have contributed to child mortality (and continue to do so) in Iraq: the corrupt Oil for Food program which was supposed to use oil money to purchase medical supplies and food but which was used to bribe politicians and journalists and terrorists using children in their attacks. Each factor deserves at least a mention as a possible contributor, if not some actual investigation. Leaving those out distorts the story and gives it a severe slant. Likewise, the only two quotes outside the source of the study are from the UN and an anti-war group which also slants the story heavily. Getting other quotes and making even a cursory attempt to investigate the topic would have led to an evenhanded ... More »

Strictly "dog bites man" here. It's no big shock that a blog founded by someone who was anti-war candidate Ned Lamont's hired blogger is anti-war. It's even less of a surprise that she'd "me too" an article that gives blogs like hers a warm fuzzy. What's not clear is what makes this a news story. There's a definite slant and opinion. There's no new information provided. There's nothing here to inform (which is why I couldn't give the story "fairness" and "big picture" rankings). There's just a blog saying "Yeah, we're still anti-war".

My first thought upon reading this story was "Okay. So it's big and bright. What about it 'rocks' astronomers?" It's a good "Isn't that neat" story but it doesn't really delve into the more interesting questions of why the supernova is "burning" far loner than normal or why this could be important. It's not often that a truly unusual event happens in the world of science that's as approachable for the average newspaper reader as this. The story, though tightly-written and informative as far as it went, missed a great opportunity to push a little more science knowledge into the public arena.

I rated the story lower in a couple categories: showing the "big picture" and the sourcing. I do not like anonymously-sourced stories. I'm one of those dinosaurs who believes that a newspaper's sources should be open and honest. I'm willing to have fewer "big scandal" stories if it means that more stories have sources whose veracity and expertise can be evaluated by those reading the stories. Rarely will I rate an anony-source story highly. The story also falls down on the "big picture" insofar as it fails to note that one of the big reasons Wolfowitz was under fire at the World Bank is because his efforts to root out corruption there was not only aggressive but also starting to be effective. Fairness also take a hit because ... More »

This story doesn't say more than "One company wants to build an off-shore wind farm. That company and an environmental groups says it's good. The company that wants to build a coal plant says their plant is better. Locals aren't sure". That's not really much of a story. It would have been helpful had the reporter done a little digging into the actual numbers. That would have made it an informative story instead of a "They said. The other guys said" typical piece.

Plenty of good links and things to research despite the obvious and predictable President-bashing. A better article would have had more fact and less spittle. Had I not been reviewing the article, I would have stopped reading after the first sentence (though the phrase "lack of faith in science" made me laugh out loud). That would have been a shame because the author really did search out some links worth clicking. It would be better in the future if she remembered that her audience doesn't not solely consist of folks who share her political views.

It's really tough to go wrong with a story about robots and this story is particularly good. It can be difficult to mix the technical with the personal but this story does it particularly well. I found the stories of soldiers bonding with "their" robots particularly interesting especially since it can provide an interesting insight into how robots may be accepted into general society as they become more prevalent.

This story gets big dings on fairness and the "big picture". The reporter obviously cherry-picked what she believed were signs of bad ethical behavior without putting any of the questions in a clear context. For example: What constitutes torture - pulling out of fingernails or sleep deprivation? Do the questions take into account the difficulty of distinguishing civilians from insurgents considering that insurgents routinely masquerade as civilians? Did she note that each of these "did you do this to a civilian" questions required a soldier to answer "yes" even if he had done something only once. Setting a context for the findings gives a more complete picture of what the survey revealed. Finally, the reporter hit several ... More »

This is basic necessary journalism. It takes a question and attempt to find solid answers to as many of the questions as possible. It plays fair with claims from both sides and provides useful information.

This is a truly impressive story. Well-sourced, with links to supporting material in the text, and as fair as a story like this with a couple different forks is likely to get, I'd recommend it to anyone who regularly consults Wikipedia for information. This appears to be a first effort to bring citizen journalists together with professional journalists to write news stories. I'm looking foward to more from this collaboration.

I was impressed by how carefully and precisely the paper presented the story. It would have been very easy for the story to slant one way or the other and it really didn't. It's an interesting story if you're a basketball fan (and I am!). It might also gain some traction in other circles of life as well. This story provides a very good starting point for those who might want to learn more.