Standard sidebar for individual issues

Each issue page should have a descriptive sidebar that helps categorize the issue (using one or more categories), provides a map of where the issue fits within its category, and provides a short description of how well-developed the issue page is.

"Well-developed" will require some definition and consensus. Some suggested axes to look at when determining overall quality:

• Number of sources cited
• Quality of sources cited (difficult to measure!)
• Quality of analysis (also difficult to measure)
• Stylistic quality (writing, links to other pages, images, etc)

It would also be beneficial to create a template for the citations themselves, again with some kind of "quality" rating, as well as a category (opinion/primary source/secondary/etc) and links to pages about the authors and publications involved. These pages could be used to discuss any perceived bias in the source authors or publications.

This suggestion is in line with my own thinking. It may take awhile before I can get to it, though, as there's some pretty substantial coding involved. If any other coders (PHP, mainly) would like to get involved, that could help substantially; I can put together detailed design documents -- collaboratively, if anyone wants to be involved in the design process.