I. The site's "point of view"

1. Who sponsors the site?

• Is it easy to determine sponsor and find information about them?
  
  
• Do they have a financial interest in the topic?
  
  
• If so, what is the nature of that interest? (you may have to go elsewhere to answer this)
  
  
• If they have no obvious financial interest, what is the nature of their interest?
  
  
• What kind of organization are they? (e.g., news, advocacy, political)
  
  
• Do they have a membership base?
  
  
• Who is their intended audience? (general public, policy-makers')
  
  
• Who supports them financially and otherwise?
  
  

2. Where do their data come from?

• Do they cite their sources?
  
  
• Are these sources reliable? Why?
  
  
  

3. What kinds of "facts" do they present?

4. In comparison with other sites, what kinds of "facts" do they not present?

5. Does their primary authority rely on

• The status of the people making the claims (e.g., you believe you can trust them because their own reputations rely on being credible) (This is argumentation from authority)
  
  
• The quality and sources of the data they use in their arguments. (This is argumentation from data.)
  
  
• The logical quality of the argument (for more on logic and argumentation, see "Argumentation and Critical Thinking Tutorial"
  
  
• Other?
  
  

6. What do you judge to be the site's primary argument or message?

• Were you able to perceive their argument based on their site (that is, that they had a particular perspective that they wished you to adopt, in contradistinction to other perspectives?), or
  
  
• did you have to go to other sources to determine that there was an argument?
  
  

7. Given your analysis, do you find that the site presents reliable information?

8. Do you find that they present reliable arguments, even if you disagree with their position?

II. Overall quality of site:

1. Can you easily find pages you looked at once (that is, is the site well-organized with easily-used navigation tools)?

2. Does the site have links to other relevant sites? How useful are these sites for your purposes?

3. Do the pages load easily?

4. Anything else?

"Talk.Origins" contains an interesting and sometimes amusing list of terms (A-page only) having to do with argumentation, among other things. Some good definitions. Includes "ad hominem argument", "argumentation from authority", "argument from design", "argument from ignorance", and several other forms of argumentation. (You can go to other sections by typing in the letter before .html). This site presents "mainstream scientific responses to the many frequently asked questions (FAQs) and frequently rebutted assertions that appear in [the Usenet newsgroup] talk.origins concerning biological and physical origins, and specifically the "creation science" debates. This site, by the way, is an excellent example of one that lets you know who they are, their position, and that there is a major debate concerning their views. Talk.Origins home page.