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Write Your Congressman -- If You Use IE

Posted by timothy on from the beholden-beholden dept.

inonit writes "Well, geez -- after all this US election talk, I got inspired to write my congresswoman. But as a good Slashdotter, imagine my irritation when I found the following note in the "Contact" section: 'In order to send an e-mail to Congresswoman Tubbs-Jones, please complete this form using the Internet Explorer browser. If the Internet Explorer browser is not available, please mail your correspondence to the listed postal mailing address above.' I don't really have the time to check all 435 Congressional sites to see if this is widespread, but it gives me some insight into why all those <sarcasm>foreigners</sarcasm> are complaining about having their governments be beholden to U.S. technology companies. Can someone running IE write my congressperson and ask her to let me write her? Does she only accept phone calls from AT&T customers?" I just tried filling out the form with Mozilla, and ended up at a page notifying me of a search error. (Huh?)

23 of 115 comments (clear)

  1. From the page source by jholder · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Which you CAN read with Mozilla"

    --
    -- John
    1. Re:From the page source by Dredd13 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I wonder if that's a standard formmail.pl complete with the exploitability for spamming?

    2. Re:From the page source by frankie · · Score: 3, Informative

      Actually it's just a broken form entirely. The other relevant line is: form method="post" action= "http://www.house.gov/htbin/formproc/tubbsjones/ht _contact1.txt &display=/tubbsjones/contact_thanks.htm" But house.gov returns a 404 error at that address.

  2. a new form of slashdoting by ealar+dlanvuli · · Score: 5, Funny

    a million teenagers calling her offices at 3pm...

    I feel for the receptionist

    --
    I live in a giant bucket.
    1. Re:a new form of slashdoting by Slipped_Disk · · Score: 3, Insightful

      And what makes you think it's just teenagers?

      I hope some 20/30/40-somethings who read slashdot (ESPECIALLY all you Ohio citizens!!) DO pick up the phone and call. While I doubt the IE-Only problem
      is deliberate, there are plenty of form mail scripts that work in .

      It is genuinely possible that the representitive in question doesn't know about this problem (do you REALLY think they read all the mail themselves?), so the best way to bring it to her attention (or at least her staff's) is to deluge them with POLITE requests that they fix the form so it works in all browsers.

      Think about it.

      --
      /~mikeg
  3. and here's the kicker... by Derek · · Score: 5, Funny
    ...quoted from the top of her "contact" page

    **NOTICE: Due to recent anthrax cases, mail delivery to the Washington office has stopped indefinitely. Please utilize e-mail, fax, and phone when possible to ensure timely receipt and response.

    So, I guess snailmail isn't even an option!!

    -Derek
  4. mal-formed html by HyperbolicParabaloid · · Score: 5, Informative

    Submitting the form in Mozilla fails because there is a Search form earlier in the page, but that form is never closed. The submit button at the bottom of the email form is in a different form, but since the first one was never closed, the browser submits the FIRST form.
    If the form were closed properly, I bet this would work fine in ANY browser.

    --


    -------------------------
    A person of moderate zeal
    1. Re:mal-formed html by clonebarkins · · Score: 5, Interesting

      It doesn't work in IE either. So much for the extraneous marketing attempt.

      --

      "The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it." -- Ayn Rand

  5. at least you can get her address by qengho · · Score: 4, Informative

    My rep (Wolf/Virginia) says this on his contact page:

    I participate in the "Write Your Representative" program of the House of Representatives so that I can more effectively respond to the needs and concerns of the people of the 10th District. A public e-mail address does not provide a way to ensure that 10th District residents get priority in reaching me over the Internet. Please click on the icon below to e-mail me through the "Write Your Representative" program.

    Whatever. He has a link to a generic form that seems browser-agnostic and uses a numeric code instead of an email address in the hidden fields.

  6. They can't even go by their own laws... by reaper20 · · Score: 4, Informative
    Section 508:

    (n) When electronic forms are designed to be completed on-line, the form shall allow people using assistive technology to access the information, field elements, and functionality required for completion and submission of the form, including all directions and cues.


    Who wants to bet this page won't pass this requirement? I'm wondering if the user's assistive technology warns them to use IE. :)

    It's been a law for a few years now, for government pages.
  7. Try Opera by reddog1 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Opera IMO works better then mozilla and has an option to identify itself as MSIE. Normally when I find a site that requires IE I flip opera to identify as IE and it all works :-) Awesome Browser

  8. Phoenix by RedWolves2 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Use Phoenix then you can set you useragent type to IE.

  9. Of course not... by ThinkingGuy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Many federal laws, including the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Civil Rights Act, the OSHA laws, to name a few, explicitly exempt the US congress and their staff.
    Congress doesn't have to follow that law... because Congress passed a law that says so :)

  10. house.gov/writerep/ works fine by stefanlasiewski · · Score: 3, Informative

    When I try to write my Representative, I am directed to http://www.house.gov/writerep/
    which works fine with Mozilla.

    No funny IE tags, no funny forms, just a classic, simple webform.

    --
    "Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
  11. Generic House Email Form by n-baxley · · Score: 3, Informative

    There is a generic email form for all house members. It doesn't say anything about needing a certain browser and I'm pretty sure that I've emailed my congress critter through this form several times.

    --

    THIS SPACE FOR RENT
  12. In the pockets of US tech companies? Surely not! by 0x0d0a · · Score: 5, Funny

    Why, *every* self-respecting contituient downloads WINE, installs it, downloads IE, installs that in WINE (doing whatever hacking is necessary to get it to work), and then uses that to contact their representative. They aren't forcing you to buy the products of the (by far) largest donor of government funds from the tech industry at all! They certainly aren't trying to quell the voices of the people that oppose it.

    --
    May we never see th
  13. Re:technically challenged by dotslash · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Making an association between an middle eastern sounding name and a terrorist organization clearly demonstates not only your depth of ignorance but also your biggotry.

  14. Re:Well, I wrote her with IE... by Penguin · · Score: 5, Funny

    My message was thus: "It is pathetic that you require Internet Explorer to submit e-mail messages. Aren't you aware the Microsoft is a convicted monopolist? The Internet runs on open protocols. Your eMail should be the same."

    What did (s)he reply? -1, Flamebait?

    (for thousands of years smileys haven't been necessary for the written media - if we just in a couple of years have lost our ability to understand irony, we have a proof of the Net making people stupid)

    --
    - Peter Brodersen; professional nerd
  15. Her page is broken by dacarr · · Score: 3, Informative
    What the subject says. You can't find search terms if you try to write her.

    Go to the house.gov link above the statement and contact her that way.

    --
    This sig no verb.
  16. Her site is busted by babbage · · Score: 3, Informative
    I just tried to send her this but couldn't. Yay, using Slash as a stand in for participatory democracy:
    As a technology professional and, based on someone who I think would agree with most of your political stances (that is, I'm want to be nice about this), please have your website amended by a qualified professional. The form used to send this message has a couple of problems that really ought to be addressed:
    • There is no good reason for a web form such as this to force visitors to use a particular kind of browser software to access it. In spite of the recent court decision t hat would suggest otherwise, Microsoft has been tried & convicted as an abusive monopolist, and if visitors take the initiative to use alternative software they should be applauded, not excluded. Keeping out users based on their commercial choices seems very anti-democratic to me.

    Thank you for your attention, and for God's sake keep voting against Bush's war against Iraq. I'm sure history will prove that you were right to oppose this. Your speech against it, at http://www.house.gov/tubbsjones/pr021009.htm, was wonderful. Thank you.

    Hey, it got written up, it might as well get posted somewhere. Maybe her staff will decide to start reading Slashdot today...

    --
    DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
  17. One stop representative shop by bignendian · · Score: 4, Informative

    Http://www.congress.org allows you to use one form to send email to all of your senators and representatives and the president. They seem to have worked their way into the webforms too.

  18. NOT a Microsoft conspiracy... by jsimon12 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    As much as I would really truly love to say she is a tool for Bill Gates it honestly looks like she is NOT. According to Open Secrets she didn't get any money from Microsoft. Just to be sure I went ahead and went through all the pages of the Microsoft donations and I could not find her listed anywhere. Looks like the bulk of her money comes from labor unions. Also if you look at the source it was created with Frontpage 5.0.

    So my guess is the whole "Use Microsoft Internet Explorer" bit is more of a lack of knowledge in creating web forms, so they used a tool that generated stuff for Internet Explorer only. My advice, pen a nice letter to her explaining and possibly offering to help, if will go a lot farther then hate and spit, especially since it looks like NONE of her money comes from Microsoft, hence this is NOT a conspiracy, I repeat NOT a conspiracy, simply a honest mistake made by someone who probably doesn't know better.

  19. People are too serious. by Futurepower(R) · · Score: 3, Funny


    This is a bad thing happening in the U.S. culture. People are too serious. I didn't assume Tannaz is a male. It was just a sloppy joke. Anyhow, I don't speak Farsi.

    The big issue is that the U.S. senators and representatives have not bought themselves some good programming for communication. Why are things still such a mess?

    My middle eastern friends and I joke about the U.S. government's love of bombing:

    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

    By joking about the U.S. invading the island of Kiribati, the New Zealand publication Spinner has delayed a plan by the U.S. government to invade every other country. The U.S. military forces plan to start with the small countries first, then work their way up to the larger ones.

    The U.S. government has invaded 14 countries in the last 33 years, and has found it so profitable that it decided to invade all the others.

    U.S. Army General Mayhem said yesterday that the military would delay the invasions while they investigate the possibility that Spinner's story was prompted by a security leak.

    General Mayhem said that the U.S. would not actually invade every other country. There are no plans to invade France. "We wouldn't want to seem arrogant", he said.