After the last blog – I was looking at THE White House official site -
and saw some good and bad use of the internet tools we’ve been learning about in class. The title graphic is classy and not too big. Colors – simple variations on blue with white space and black type. Nothing too flashy.
They have a simple list – again type not too large – listing on the left listing 19 subjects under the heading “In Focus” . They are in alphabetical order so no one can accused the White House of playing favorites on certain topics – I guess. But I also see a missed opportunity to bring in video to enhance what the words on the page are saying. The Afghanistan page – for example – has a top item talking about a video conference the President did:
President Bush Participates in Video Teleconference with Afghanistan Provincial Reconstruction Team Leaders and Brigade Combat Commanders
And you roll you cursor over the text – and NOTHING. NO link to the teleconference they reference in the text. But there is a LONG 13 line explanation of what our strategy in Afghanistan is. Oh- and I forgot to mention – above these exciting bits of words on a white background – is a photo -
Bush official handshake
Again – VERY official handshake photo. Not a lot of imagination here.
Back to the front page of the website – IS a fun photo – of the President with something every politician is apt to be captured holding – a small child!
The President plays in Peoria
You also see some other graphics and photos that link to more photos.
But some of the newer connectors for people in the “connected’ world – I am pleased to see. They have a link to RSS feeds – a link to podcasts – but they are all audio only podcasts. The page is nicely laid out – but the buttons beneath each topic read ”play audio”. The they have podcasts ont he right side of the page – and those are not quite – ready for prime time. The pages look like this:
<?xml version=”1.0″ encoding=”UTF-8″ ?>
- <rss xmlns:itunes=”http://www.itunes.com/DTDs/Podcast-1.0.dtd“ version=”2.0“>
I know my own network offers video podcasts for Nightly News. (but it’s not on You Tube – it’s a mediafly file – and I could not get our Word Press system to put it in the blog – so I’ll put a graphic in)
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But the White House DOES have some fun videos on the site. Like this one featuring – none other than – Barney (the dog) – who is moving a little slow these days. But I can’t put the White House link on our blog – so here’s a version of one of the White House Barney videos that ITN did a story on -
And the ones they do on the kids playing little league baseball are precious – but you’ll have to go to the site to see them – click on the kids tab in the upper right hand corner of the screen.
