President Barack Obama replaced the Bush administration's White House website at noon on Inauguration Day. The new website has been met with both applause and criticism in its first week of operation, but it offers indications of how the new president may utilize Internet technology to better inform the public.

In one of its first posts, the first presidential blog announced that the touchstones of the new website would be communication, transparency, and participation.

Communication

The new White House website features RSS feeds, similar to the old version, allowing people to be updated on site changes through an RSS reader, without having to continuously check the site. The site also allows the public to sign up for e-mail updates.

Currently, however, users are unable to access information that had been posted on the former administration's White House site. Some of those pages still show up in Google searches, but the links redirect users to the relevant Obama administration pages rather than archived versions of the old pages.

To address a similar website transition, the State Department created an archived version of the department's Bush-era website, which is available to the public. The State Department's effort provides easy public access to government information, much of which is still relevant, and could serve as an example for other agencies as well as the White House. Past presidential websites, such as that of the Clinton administration and Bush administration's White House website, have been preserved by the National Archive and Records Administration, but links from the new White House site would probably be most helpful for people looking for older information.

Transparency

The new White House website models much of its design and layout from the transition team's former website, change.gov. In a previous Watcher article, we commented that change.gov demonstrated a commitment to transparency during that hectic planning phase, which boded well for the importance of transparency during Obama's time in office.

This also seems to be the case for the new whitehouse.gov. The White House website now has a blog, which is often updated multiple times a day and contains all of President Obama's executive orders and memoranda to date. It also links back to the Federal Register for previous presidential orders.

Participation

Of note on the White House site is the inclusion of YouTube videos as the standard format for the president's weekly address. Despite initial controversy over tracking cookies installed by YouTube, the White House quickly managed to resolve issues when they were raised by the public. The president has promised to post all non-emergency legislation to the White House website and open it up to public review and commentary.

While the new website boasts greater participation, it has been criticized for not meeting expectations for greater interactivity. Neither the YouTube nor blog posts currently allow for comments from the public. The website has a contact page that allows users to send messages to the webmaster, but it does not provide the same opportunities for public discourse as change.gov did. The blog might take on the same comment features as the State Department's blog, which has a moderated comments policy.

The Government Shift to Information Age 2.0

The administration is still hurrying to apply its openness standards to its information infrastructure. Media coverage indicates that the new White House has been burdened by software difficulties — operating on software platforms that have not been upgraded in six years. The website also does not include transcripts of press conferences at this time.

The primary question may not be whether the administration will apply its change.gov innovations to federal Internet technology, but rather whether or not the Washington bureaucracy will be slow and resistant to such change. Forging the White House website into an example for transparency, participation, and openness for other agencies may require considerable cultural change within the government, as well as several rule changes.

Macon Phillips, director of New Media at the White House, has asked for suggestions concerning improvements or ideas to the website. You can provide your feedback using the White House's contact form.