Unrestricted Web Publishing: Not All Bad

I chose an article from The New York Times to evaluate:

American Way of Birth, Costliest in the World by Elisabeth Rosenthal

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/01/health/american-way-of-birth-costliest-in-the-world.html?ref=us

The article describes the costs of maternity care in the United States versus other developed countries in the world.

When reading the article and evaluating the author as well as the credibility of the sources, I referred to the guidelines set in Criteria to Evaluate the Credibility of WWW Resources. I determined that this article was a valuable and accurate piece of news.

1. Is the author an expert/authority on the subject?

 After doing some research on the author, Elisabeth Rosenthal, I found out that she is a medical doctor who attended Harvard Medical School. She has worked for the NYTimes since 1997 focusing on health and the environment. There were a couple lapses in credibility that I found concerning Rosenthal. One stems from a 2010 article she wrote on climate change. Critics of the article she wrote said that her piece was very one-sided and only used one source to represent an entire group of scientists. Other times she has been accused of being a left-wing activist who poses as an impartial reporter. While normally these would be a red-flag when evaluating the credibility of a source, Rosenthal's career seems to be quite clean of any controversies other than the ones listed. I can dismiss these specifically when dealing with the article I chose because her expertise is in the medical field and the article I chose lists many sources all of which are linked to the specific place where she got the information or names of the actual people that she talked to.

2. Is the author affiliated with an organization? 

Rosenthal is not affiliated with any organizations at this time other than the NYTimes.

3. Does the author have any peer reviewed work?

I did not find any peer reviewed work by Elizabeth Rosenthal.

4. Does the author seem biased?

On this particular subject, Elizabeth Rosenthal doesn't seem to be biased. She is a woman, but I am not sure if she has children. I think this is important because the fact that I don't know if she has children from reading the article means that she did not push her own experience on the reader. She uses many sources, including women who have given birth in the U.S. and in other developed countries. She also talked to doctors who explain the costs of child birth in both the U.S. and other countries and why these costs differ so greatly. I feel she covers all the bases and is not taking a specific side in the matter.

5. Is info current? Do links still work?

All of the information is current in Rosenthal's article. She provides hyperlinks to all of the places where she gathered her data and they were all in working order.

6. Is the info backed up with sources?

Yes, all of the information she provides is backed up with sources. Like I said before, Rosenthal uses names of the doctors and the women that she spoke with and she also provides links to websites of all of the organizations where she got her data.

7. Does this subject need print sources in addition to WWW sources?

This piece was available in the print version of the NYTimes on July 1, 2013. In this case, the online version was more useful because there was a correction made to the age of a source's child that was easily changed and noted online, but harder to do so in the print version since it was already out there. I think print sources can be helpful to back up WWW sources, though, because a lot of the times print sources tend to be more reliable because of the time it takes to put them together. The research is checked and rechecked before it goes to print. Online anyone can post anything about anyone whether it is true or not. 

8. What kind of website is it?

Rosenthal's piece was on a News and Journalistic site, The New York Times. It is the online version of the print version, which in my opinion, is credible.

In the case of this particular article, unrestricted web publishing through mass media can be a positive thing. People are able to find an online version of an already credible source to get their news from at the touche of a button. For people who aren't able to buy The New York Times every single day in print form, the online version is is available for free. In general, though, we should always be wary of WWW sources because anyone can put anything on the web whether it is accurate or not. We must always investigate who produced the information to find out if they are credible and if the sources they used are credible as well. It is in our own hands to determine the credibility of those providing information to us.