If You Had To Vote Based On Candidates' Web Pages
Kookus writes "Which party has the best team of web deployers/developers?
Neither main page passes w3c's html validator, but Kerry's has much fewer "errors". These pages do not seem to do well on Bobby either...
Both seem to be using Akamai's HTTP Acceleration/Mirror service which appears to be running linux,
Granted that it is hard to please everyone; which team is doing the best job?"
Well, one of them tells me I'm not authorized to access it...
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
stupidest idea ever. Granted, it's news for nerds, but if you're so undecided still that you pick based on which website looks better, then please surrender your franchise immediately
Not because his website is particularly great, but because, if you View Source, you get...
Because, as we all know, Al used to hand write his HTML...You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I tried to validate slashdot from that url, and got an error. So I'm not sure.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
can't we find something more *political* to talk about? nobody who cares about politics cares about candidate website standards conformity.
if what the current administration is doing doesn't stop, it will put an end to this nation as we know it within our lifetime. what they are doing is making decisions that line their own pockets without concern for the voters or the country. greed is destructive.
did you know, for example that the current administration has previously sought legal means to postpone or cancel and election that they have no jurisdiction over? did you know that there are legal documents drafted by john ashcroft & co. that give legal justification to the torture that went on at abu ghraib (sp?) prison? then, when ordered by congress to turn over the documents, mister ashcroft refused? that's contempt of congress, folks.
i could go on - can we please talk about something more relevant that fucking standards compliance on politics.slashdot.org?
True, it's pretty silly. (And pretty clearly a joke, given the icons posted with the story.) But is it worse than picking a candidate based on who is more attractive or taller? Given that people seem to use things like looks or who they're most like to have a beer with, I'm not sure the web page validity is necessarily a significantly dumber criterion. They all leave me weeping for my country.
neither does slashdot, home of the world's ugliest HTML.
lets talk about how compliant slashdot is before we talk about other sites' compliance, please.
you know, the whole "police yourself before you police others" thing that we hear so much these days.
Politics (Pudge): Oh, yeah? Well, Kerry repeatedly got Red Sox scores wrong!
Politics (Timothy): But they both --- serve their campaign sites on Linux!
Audience: Hugs all around! And if we cared about HTML standards compliance, we wouldn't be reading Slashdot!
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
403 Access Denied
(and the error page does not have a correct DTD)
Make even shorter URLs - 8LN.org
Wasn't it a public knowledge that Pentagon was struck by a American Airlines 757 plane, but this is not what really happenend http://www.sodaro.com/Plone/ps/
Nobody consciously chooses a candidate based on their height or hair, just like no one consciously chooses CEOs that way. Physical appearance has a subconscious effect on how individuals are perceived. Weep away, but you're most likely no different.
Relax. I don't think this is meant in any seriousness.
for political candidates it makes little sense, but I used this method for picking a dentist when I moved to a new area:
1. went to my dental insurance website and found dentists sorted by distance from my home address
2. googled each name until I found the first one with his own website (i.e. not just listed on some "dentists of NJ" website)
The method actually worked very well - the first place with a website turned out to be a dental office that was new, clean, and technologically advanced. USB based x-rays that show up immediately after they are taken, computer based patient management system in the room so the guy can bring up my previous exams and x-rays, etc.
of course, I had nothing else to compare, so website was basically one step above just randomly picking a guy. Vote for president should take a little more thought.
2. The halloween webcam - vote for Hulk page W3C validates (except for the (intentional) marque tag, which most browsers handle, although Internet Exploder handles the behavior='slide' better than Firefox)
3. Hulk's web site has "survived" being FARK'ed, Slashdotted, Ernie's House of WhoopAss, etc. ... and also provides hourly updated web stats
4. Hulk's web site was "attacked" by a "Kerry-Bot" that tried to stuff the ballot but those votes were chucked and IP was banned.
5. Hulk's site is running Linux/Apache/Perl per the FAQ (obligatory suckup to the /. crowd ;-)
6. Hulk's site allow you to vote before the election (and vote often!) ... and shows you the results real-time - they currently are:
HULK: 9,386 BUSH: 9,151 KERRY: 8,623
7. Hulk's site done by ONE Puny Human in his spare time ... and is just a lot more fun!
Yawn. Here's the rebuttal.
Bleh.
Fellowship 9/11
While it's true people don't often explicitly vote for someone because he's more handsome, it doesn't seem like it's that far below the surface in their thinking. Several times I've heard people say, "I think so-and-so just looks like a nicer person," and other things to that effect.
With all the replication logic that must be implemented to serve the website's contents to all the Internets, Bush's site is clearly technologically superior to Kerry's. This is why they must limit access only to the US
There are a huge number of yeast infections in this county. Probably because we're downriver from the bread factory.
It is a joke, but it doesn't ask which candidate you're going to vote for ;) It asks which candidate has the best web developers.
Personally I'm a democrat, but I like Bush' layout more. It also depends on if you are a standards stickler. In my place of work I don't get a choice of coding my pages for IE or Netscape only... It has to work with everything (within reason). Also I don't get to skip out on accessibility issues since some of my clientelle actually do have dissabilities.
In the end my vote is on Kerry's developers... Subtract a few spaces from tags n stuff and his page is the cleanest.
Autistic people and hackers are different- we judge people based on what they do, not what they say or how they look.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Tried www.georgewbush.com from europe says:
Access Denied
You don't have permission to access "http://www.georgewbush.com/" on this server.
I guess they are not interested in the votes of Americans living abroad.
"Fighting terrorists with millitary might is like killing a mosquitor on your Dad's forehead with a rifle."
I can't find the email message now because I'm supposed to be working, but Vint Cerf told me that, before Al Gore, the ARPANET was a private utility. Al Gore decided it should be a public service, and provided considerable support from the U.S. Congress to turn the ARPANET into the Internet.
Many people did the work. Many people should have some of the credit. But, according to Vint Cerf, Al Gore was the first public official to decide that there should be a public utility called the Internet.
It shocks me how little people know about the activities of their government. It shocks me that, after all this time, people are still believing the disinformation written by Republican marketing writers.
Don't believe the sound bites, read books. No one who read the more than 35 books about the Bush administration would vote for George W. Bush, that is clear.
Even those who read magazines would know more than most U.S. citizens. For example:
100 Facts and 1 Opinion -- The Non-Arguable Case Against the Bush Administration.
What about the third parties? It's only fair to give them a chance to compete with the big guys.
Can you people come up with any dumber reasons who to vote for? Here is a selection of other things you might consider when voting:
1. What did each candidate have for breakfast?
2. Do they snore?
3. Who does your dog bark at more?
4. Do you get better tv reception when Bush is on or Kerry?
5. Who would Leiutenant Worf vote for?
Give me a break already!
Bush(www.georgewbush.com): 303 errors.
Kerry(www.johnkerry.com): 2 errors.
Nader(www.votenader.org): unable to validate.
Badnarik(badnarik.org): 13 errors.
Cobb(www.votecobb.org): 217 errors.
Badnarik: 13 Errors
Bush: 303 Errors
Kerry: 33 Errors
Nader: Unable to validate
It should be noted that Kerry's page is just a splash screen. If geeks voted based on errors, it would be Badnarik in a landslide!
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
Drat you! you beat me by a minute!!! Anyway, I got a much different number of errors for Kerry than you did.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
Most likely because you pointed the validator to the actual splash page adress, rather than the simple www.johnkerry.com address that redirects you to the splash page.
True. I think it is valid to use the first page the visitor sees though. The reality of it is a simple redirect page shouldn't have any errors, and a simple "splash" page shouldn't have 33.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
Www.georgewbush.com kills my mozilla, dead, everytime. Building a website is apperantly "hard work".
.. I wouldn't vote for Bush, we can't see his website.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
a simple "splash" page shouldn't have 33.
Indeed. BTW, his actual index page at www.johnkerry.com/index.html brings back 46 errors on the HTML validator.
The reality of it is a simple redirect page shouldn't have any errors, and a simple "splash" page shouldn't have 33.
And for those wondering, his actual index page at www.johnkerry.com/index.html brings back 46 errors when fed through the HTML validator.
That is to say a uninformed decision.
Anyone who votes based just on what they find on the websites is an idiot. It's like taking a rapist's word for it that he won't do it again.
The submitter's 'Neither' is telling. Does he know that there are other parties?
Yeah, It's Funny. Laugh.
I would, but I'm sick to my stomach of this fucking election, the 'major' candidates, the rhetoric, and lies.
ha ha.
Okay, I meant "publically available utility".
Days ago I posted what I thought would've been an interesting story to Slashdot readers since it involved them. The idea was sparked last month while reading a Slashdot exclusive interview (can you guess which one?). Actually to be specific, it was inspired while reading the reader's comments. But to my dismay, the story wasn't posted (timothy was the one accepting stories at the time).
I run into this type of problem a lot on Slashdot. Sometimes I post comments, with what I feel are interesting thoughts, and they never get modded up. I attribute this to the fact that I prefer to be an Anonymous Coward, and I'm not part of the social circle so I am ignored. But I suppose it's possible my comments just suck.
Hours ago I reposted the original story, but completely reworded, and posted as Anonymous Coward rather than the previous name. After seeing this story, "If You Had To Vote Based On Candidates' Web Pages", I don't even care to wait and see if this new reworded one is posted.
I will reply to this comment with the story I submitted so you the reader can decide whether or not it is more interesting than which campaign has the best web team.
While everyone is scrambling to prevent another Florida incident, these people are questioning the results even if we get it perfect. They want to measure the accuracy of the voting system itself by comparing it to a virtual election using approval voting.
Don't forget David Cobb of the Green Party or the Libertarian entry among others.
*nitpick*
Not necessarily autistic people. Rather, people with a more childlike view of the world. Depending on the depth and severity of the autism, an autistic person may have a more immature view of the world than a non-autistic person. Certainly, most peopl diagnosed with autism exhibit this immaturity.
(I have to nitpick when I see things like this; I'm one of the lucky, "high-functioning," autistics.)
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
So am I- and I wouldn't call my view child-like at all, just different. In a way, it's MORE mature than the average adult judging people on appearance as if they never got out of high school (I hated that part of high school). But then again, that's why I included hackers as well- the Hacker's Ethic states that such judgements are bogus criteria. Could also include St. James the Epistle Writer I guess- he's the one who started that whole bit about works being more important than faith, about what you do being more important than what you appear to do.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Sounds like it worked out well for you, but it could also mean that dentist needs more patients. Of course, if the practice is new, then it's not a problem.
I went through my list once, looking for names that said "not currently accepting new patients", and called those offices until I found one that was.
Not terribly scientific, but better than judging by last names.
I suppose this is a better option than deciding not to vote for someone because they don't know their baseball facts. Even I know that the Sox won with a triple blurns in the bottom of the 7th Blurn.
In a way, it's MORE mature...
Agreed completely, if you replace "mature" with "logical. For you and I, maturity implies logic, at least in the context of this discussion. However, if you think about it, children tend to be much more logical about things than "mature" people. After a few inquiries, they can frequently cut through the red tape of politics, prejudices and social-interaction nuances that tie the actions of their parents.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Yeah, but if he were the New York Times, tomorrow's headline would be "Bush's Campaign Website contains 150 times as many errors as Kerry's"
CBS would have scooped the story, but they were following up on some kind of banking deal from Nigeria.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
the libertarian web site beats the two major party sites which actually has to watch what they say. Badnarik even says that he strongly supports the second amendment; we all know george 'double-yah' bush would love to say something like that, but knows he will get his ass chewed for that. And thats why Badnarik is cool... http://www.lp.org/
I thought what I'd do was, I'd pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes. - Catcher in the Rye
Considering the site you saw this on doesn't even validate, itself...
Yeah, right.
Unable to validate. That's great.
http://www.cpusa.org/
;-) .
'Nuff Said
Very funny.
Someone (or more likely several people) did hand write his html. The indenting is structured and logical, and there are little notes to eachother here and there.
Did you ever try to get personal Internet access back in the ARPANET days? You could not. It was a private facility of large public institutions and big companies like Textronix.
Sure, you could shell into your company or government or educational account from home. But if you were just an average person, you could not get an account.
You said, "... there is a long, long, long list of people who are more deserving of the credit that Gore would ascribe to himself."
Vint Cerf said that Al Gore deserves unique credit. Back in those days, which are very difficult to remember now, you had to buy your floppy disks from a special company, and they really were floppy.
Back then it was the raw, early, ugly days of computing. (Just like it is now, with one big monopolist and proprietary file formats, and quirky, partly finished software that wastes your time, like Windows XP SP2.)
Back then, there was no one who had power in the U.S. Congress besides Gore understood anything technical. It's difficult to remember that now. Back then, people just did not relate to computing issues. If you knew something about computing, you were considered socially eccentric.
Back then, the ARPANET was thriving, but it was used by people who considered themselves privileged, and were privileged, and definitely did not want to share their privileges.
Back then, DARPA, the U.S. government's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency would give ARPANET access to institutions and companies that were part of the effort to find new and better ways to kill people and destroy their property. Back then, it was perceived that there were enemies everywhere and it was important to protect ourselves by waging all war all the time. (Just like now.) It was called the "Cold" War. The U.S. government killed people, but the killing had to be a secret from the average citizen.
Back then there was an extremely acrimonious discussion about a new-fangled idea, the
Back then, there were not enough viruses for everyone; we had to share. Back then systems were mostly not vulnerable, viruses were spread through the honor system. Okay, that is a joke. It took Microsoft to invent sloppily coded operating systems that would assure the widespread availability of viruses. Unfortunately, that is not a joke.
Back then, there was a new-fangled gadget, the Hayes 2400 Baud modem, which few could afford. There were fears that such high-speed use would cause problems for the telephone system.
Al Gore had technical knowledge. Al Gore had power in government because he was a senator and a famous senator's son. He put the full weight of government behind the idea that just anyone could have access.
--
Bush borrows money to kill Iraqis. 140 billion borrowed. With interest, you pay 200 billion. When Saudis attack, invade Iraq?
You claimed ARPANET was a "private utility". This is incorrect. It was always public. Anyone who could afford the *hardware* could join in. It wasn't Al Gore who gave the internet to the masses, but cheaper hardware. Once the hardware got cheap enough ISPs started popping up everywhere.
I am not dissing Gore's involvement in promoting the internet, but I'm not going to give him more credit than he deserves.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
Dubya is TEH SUXX0R as President, but damn he did a good job impregnating Laura. Pron of the twins tag-teaming trannie Anne Coulter -- that would be HOT.
Bush's site uses ASP. Kerry uses PHP. ASP evidence: http://www.dangrover.com/blog/data/upimages/busher rorsmall.jpg
PHP: search through the source, you'll find a few .php links.
http://php.weblogs.com/php_vs_asp
Let me try.....
www.georgewbush.com: 303 Errors
www.johnkerry.com: 46 Erros
www.votenader.org: unable to validate
(wrong character set? something about not being utf-8 compliant.)
(That sounds bad)
badnarik.org: 12 Errros
www.votecobb.org: Proxy Error
(Can't reach the site. Down for maintenance?)
www.peroutka2004.com: No Character Encoding Found! Falling back to UTF-8.
(Unable to Validate)
(Can't leave out the Christian Reconstructionists
And finally, the most important validation....
www.bushrelativesforkerry.com: 24 Errors.
Oh, wait, I just looked at Badnarik's entry in the voter's pamphlet and he lists his occupation as Sofware Engineer.
That settles it. All true geeks must vote for Badnarik.
Nobody died when Nixon lied.
I'm meeting you half way you stupid hippies!
www.georgewbush.com Can't access it here in Australia. I think he's blocked access for those outside the USA?