Political Design

I generally avoid blogging about anything political, but this article by the New York Times was simply too interesting to pass up:

"Is Obama a Mac and Clinton a PC?" by Noam Cohen
Picture by the New York times

This article looks at the candidates from purely a design perspective, having several designers critique the websites of the two democratic primary candidates. Considering that this may become the first political race ever to be won over the internet, I find this a fascinating and pertinent dialog. One day, we may look at these factors with the same importance as the television was for Kennedy against Nixon.

The consensus of opinion is, of course, that Obama's site is gorgeous.

Barackobama.com

I have been a long admirer of this site. It is diaphanous and stylish. It gives the effect that the entire thing holds a kind of aura. It is incredibly 2.0. This was a great direction to go into for OBama, considering that the majority of his supporters are young and web saavy. It was a bold move on the side of his campaign to create a site like this, though several designers in the article wonder if this site may create the "Mac" effect - essentially, that it could deter a section of the population that finds such high design almost offensive (in a way, like the way many consider the Mac guy annoying rather than a protagonist). I personally don't believe this to be the case, as the Mac guy is annoying because he's a smartass, not because he represents an aesthetic. Of course, I also want to be Mac's baby mama, so I am a bit biased.

Clinton's site is much more typical of a political website. Which in terms of her supporter base, also makes sense:

Hillaryclinton.com

I feel the site is a good one in that is well laid out and can handle a lot of content. But the design is not very interesting, and really it's a lot of the same old thing in terms of site design. However, this may be an entirely conscious choice on the part of the Clinton campaign, as they are trying to brand Hillary as the "blue-collar candidate." Boyfriend Kaboom, even went so far as to describe it as "folksy," which I thought was an interesting insight.

There is one thing that bothers me greatly about this site - the contribution buttons. With so much information on the page, the design of the buttons give the effect that they are screaming for importance, much more so than any other candidates' in the primaries. The fact that there are three (THREE!) on the immediate page is already surprising, but that someone chose to style them all differently is not only poor consistency, but creates a rather garish effect. And I think it was a terribly tacky move to put a dollar sign on the large one. Other than that though, I feel generally lukewarm about this site. It takes no risks, and there really isn't much I can say about it.

After reading this article, I decided to take a peek at the McCain site. And I have to say, out of all three, I find his the most surprising:

Johnmccain.com

Black... Conceptually, I would immediately reject this choice. If someone were to say to me, "I am going to design a political site where black is the main color, and I depict the American flag in the top banner in greyscale," my first reaction would be to balk. But I have to say that the results are much better than I would ever would have imagined. In fact, I find McCain's the sleekest of all three sites. Like the website equivalent of a Porshe. I do wonder however, if the all together effect isn't a bit too somber, perhaps even funerary. I feel the design might profit from some altering to brighten the page, and make it feel a bit more hopeful.

Next week, I'll give my review of the Christopher Walken in '08 campaign site. Creepiest. Candidate. Ever.