When the Republican Party launched a new website in October of last year, they had some serious problems with the new site. The media ate it up.
Within a few days, media outlets ranging from Politico to "The Daily Show" to the Huffington Post to the Christian Science Monitor - and, of course, a host of liberal blogs - had weighed in on the website's problems. Their commentaries mostly took the form of mockery.
Last week, the Democratic Party launched a new site of its own. It too had some major bugs in the hours after it went live. The media's response: crickets.
The following clip aired on the Daily Show on October 15, two days after the GOP's site launched:
In celebration of the problems with the Republican Party's new site, the Huffington Post compiled "The 9 Worst GOP Attempts to Use New Media."
Other lefty blogs predictably weighed in with delight. Talking Points Memo provided particularly excessive coverage. The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder came up with his own "top 10" list - this one with all the reasons the new website was "fizzlin'." Think Progress offered its own disdain for RNC Chairman Michael Steele's efforts to reach out to conservatives.
Some more traditional media outlets offered their comments as well.
"There's a metaphor in here somewhere, proclaimed the CS Monitor. It went on to quote Democratic technology consultant Joe Rospars - as did a number of others in the media - who said, "You know your web program is in trouble when your site can't even handle the traffic bump from people making fun of your web program."
One wonders where such criticism was when, in the midst of widespread mockery throughout the blogosphere, the Democratic Party's new website, relentlessly hyped in the week before its launch, displays as a blank, white page or a series of clear technical glitches within hours of its launch.
Screenshots sent to NewsBusters by a few beltway tech professionals who asked to remain anonymous show just how poor of a state the website was in:
And:
And while the site may have been mocked by a number of prominent bloggers, there has been virtual silence from the mainstream media.
Yes, conservative bloggers mocked the Democrats' site just as liberal bloggers mocked the Republicans' site. But don't expect to see Jon Stewart weigh in on the latter any time soon.
