Tolkien Studies on the Web reviews Web sites and offers tips on how to pick good sites for your research.
It's best to stay away from Wikipedia and encyclopedia style Web sites because they are usually biased, or incomplete, or misleading. The better sites don't pretend to be fair about topics. They just present their points of view and maybe offer links to alternative points of view.
If a Tolkien Web site tries to explain a point of view its author doesn't believe in, how good (or honest) a job can you expect that person to do? Just look for Web sites that offer what they want to say and that don't try to explain how other people view things. Scholarship is not about explaining what other say for them. It's about finding what other people say and letting them speak for themselves.
Good scholarship can respond to other scholarship (good or bad), but it should make it easy for the reader to find the original source material. You should be able to judge for yourself whether you agree with one or the other side.
The problem with Wiki sites is that anyone can change them at any time. They don't have any process in place to keep people from posting their own propaganda. Wikipedia is especially bad about being abused by propagandists.
This Web site was designed and created by and for fans of J.R.R. Tolkien and Middle-earth. No Balrogs where harmed in the making of this Web site. However, some small business internet marketing may have been ignored for the convenience of our readers.