Political Garbage

November 18, 2003 | View Comments (10) | Category: Design

Summary: Political websites are a waste of Internet space.

First you might want to check this out. If you are not sure what those numbers represent let's just say that they are not good. They are really not good. Now if you go look at all of the websites on the list you will see one thing. They are really not good. Since these guys (and lady) are getting some pretty nice dough for their campaigns and want to only pay $150 it seems to build a website I figured I would offer some free tips to improve the sites.

I am only going to touch on one or two points for each website because I am only writing an entry, not a novel. Here we go.

Howard Dean

Who better to start with than the man whose campaign is being driven by the Internet. For Dean I will keep it simple. Get rid of the black background for the navigation and the other dark browns colors. It just doesn't give the site a feel good democratic feeling. Besides when I look at the site the only thing I get to look at is the navigation. My eyes just loved to be sucked into that wonderful black hole. Second color mishap is the white button for the "Join the Campaign" form. There is absolutely no reason to use a white button on a white background. Somebody just got a little too cute here.

Carol Moseley Braun

I have no idea who this lady is, but she is running for president so she needs to get the website usability treatment as well. Hmmm, to be honest the site isn't that bad from a usability standpoint. Let's check out the source code. I am guessing Carol isn't receiving the large amount of money that the other candidates are receiving so maybe it would help if her very simple site was done in some very simple CSS to cut down on bandwidth. Too many "bgcolor" attributes. Even if she wanted to keep tables, better use of CSS would greatly improve everything. Also the campaign news section on the homepage just seems to be one huge paragraph. Why not add some separation with margins or borders to clearly define different items.

Al Sharpton

I give the man props for going with a totally different color scheme then the rest of the candidates. That is really the only thing he has going for him here. The whole page is almost a giant image. And the images on the page...well, he doesn't even look real in the pictures! Color scheme although different doesn't offer a political feel. And what is this about having to click an image to see a political announcement?

Dennis Jucinich

Okay I don't know if anyone else noticed this one, but under his photograph is the name Mark-Hull Richter. I am sure this is the photographer's name, but shouldn't it say Photo by: Mark-Hill Richter. I wasn't sure if this was Dennis or not, which then made me wonder why would he be so scared to put his own pictue on his own website. And which election is he going for? 1998 or 2004, because his website seems to have been taken from 1996. Everything is just too cramped.

John Edwards

Scrolling marquee. Scolling marquee. John, for the two seconds I looked at your site it didn't look that bad, then I saw the scrolling marquee and panicked, so I had to close the window.

John Kerry

Some visual distinction between sections could go a long way to helping this site. There are some neat items on the site, but again like everyone else the site is just crammed. Everything is piled on top of each other it seems. Two borders would work wonders. The only site to use Flash...for no apparent reason.

Dick Gephardt

The only liquid design here. Mad props to Dick. But the liquid design is futile when the site is so ugly. Those "annoucements" on the right side look like banner ads. Lose them or change their look. Politicians sell enough garbage, let's not make people think you are trying to sell viagra also.

George W. Bush

Unfortunately, I might have to say that Bush has the best site here. He has the money and experience so he should have delivered an effective website. Usability wise though he has three layers of navigation all on the homepage. Somehow this could greatly be simplified.

The Outcome

It would be interesting to see if a candidate actually produced a quality website that follow accessibility guidelines how effectively this would help his/her campaign. The web can be a very powerful tool if used effectively (ask Dean). However, I am not going on a limb here to say that all of these sites suck. They are bloated and unattractive. Most of them have javascript just to have javascript. At least they could have put decent images of themselves up on the page. There is no excuse for that. Only one site doesn't exceed a 100k. Amazing. If there were ever a good time to use CSS here it is. It is sad that these candidates don't take more care into what happens on their websites. The web is cheaper for them than TV ads and reaches more people so why wouldn't they want to create an effective experience?

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