The New Obama 2012 website: Not ready for prime time.

[Skinner]

As everyone here probably knows, President Obama is formally launching his campaign for reelection today. There is even an ad running on DU right now from the campaign announcing the launch of his website. As an enthusiastic supporter of the President who raised more than $110,000 for his campaign in 2008 (along with the help of all my friends on DU), I was eager to sign up again to help his re-election campaign.

So, I went to barackobama.com. I browsed past the solicitation for my email address and found the "Get Involved" button, which I clicked. Then I clicked the "Grassroots Fundraising" button. I was prompted to enter my email address and password to get in. I entered the same address and password which I used in 2008, and to my great pleasure I was able to log in. (Thank you.)

I clicked the "Click here to get started" link to get started. Entered my goal and a name for my fundraising page, and also gave a "Short name". According to the website: "This will be used to create an easy to remember URL for your page. We suggest you use your name or nickname. Letters and numbers only. No spaces." I entered "du" which was my short name back in 2008.

Oops.

The software tells me "This slug is already in use. Please select a different one." Slug refers to my short name ("du").

I have a strong suspicion that the slug "du" is already in use because I used it back in 2008. Unfortunately, there is no way for me to tell for sure.

Just to double-check that I did use the term "du" in 2008, I went back and tried to find the old URL for my previoius fundraising page. A search of my email using the keywords "my.barackobama.com" and "/du" confirms that we did in fact use the URL "/du" for our 2008 fundraising. Somewhat ironically, the email I found which confirmed this fact was one that I sent to the campaign shortly after President Obama was elected:

TEXT OF EMAIL FROM NOVEMBER 2008:

Dear NAME REDACTED:

My name is David Allen, I am the administrator of the popular liberal website Democratic Underground, http://www.democraticunderground.com. Visitors to my website have been enthusiastic supporters of President-elect Obama throughout the campaign, and together donated more than $110,000 through our My Barack Obama fund-raising page: http://my.barackobama.com/page/outreach/view/main/du

I called the Obama campaign today, and was instructed to email you with my request.

I was wondering if it would be possible for President-elect Obama to post a message on Democratic Underground thanking our members for their support in the campaign. If not, could we get a written thank you letter from him which I could scan and post on our website? We receive more than 100,000 unique visitors on most days, and I know that they would be absolutely thrilled to receive some sort of communication from the president-elect.

If you have any questions, I can be reached by email or by phone: NUMBER REDACTED. Thank you for time.

David Allen
Administrator
Democratic Underground

(Incidentally, I never got a response to this email from the campaign. To be fair, I know what it is like to be inundated with email and not be able to reply to all of it. But if someone gave me $100,000, I would not need that person to make a phone call and submit an email request in order to remember to say "Thank you." To this day I am still appalled that I never received any type of Thank You from the campaign. If I had raised $100,000 for the Bush campaign, I would have had the honorific "Bush Pioneer" bestowed upon me. From the Obama campaign: Nothing. If anyone from the Obama campaign is reading this, it sure would be nice if someone contacted me and ASKED if I would do President Obama the favor of raising $100,000 again. Hint, hint. But I digress.)

As for my 2012 "slug," I would like to use "/du" again if it hasn't been taken by someone else (other than my 2008 self).

So, I look for some kind of contact form to get in touch with the campaign. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click "Contact Us." I am provided with a list of options indicating the type of problem I have, so my contact will go to the right place. I click "About Technical Issues" and I'm taken to another page where I fill out a form explaining my problem. I click "Submit" and (drumroll please)....

Nothing happens.

Oh, the irony.

I click submit again and again and again and nothing happens. So I back out of the page and select "Other" and fill out that form and click "Submit" but nothing happens again.

So, on a hunch I exit out of my extremely rare web browser known as "Firefox" (perhaps you've heard of it) and launch Microsoft Internet Explorer instead. After logging in, the Barack Obama "Contact Us" page deigns to accept my submission, and sends me an extremely promising confirmation email that promises "it may be a few weeks until we’re able to respond".

No worries. I'll wait.

Considering the fact that they plan to raise http://www.google.com/search?q=billion+dollar+campaign">$1 billion, I can see how the campaign might not be too concerned about little old me with my hope of raising a measley $100K.

ON EDIT: I have received an email response from the campaign. Very fast. Unfortunately my Internet connection for my laptop is down, and I can't seem to log in to my barackobama.com account from my phone. So I'll have to wait for Internet before I can log on and (hopefully) set up the DU fundraising page.

[The Straight Story]

1. Well, if they get the $1 Billion maybe they can hire a new web design team

:)

[LaurenG]

2. You'd think they'd be ready for this since he officially announced,

I think its strange that no one on his staff takes better care than that. :shrug:

[n2doc]

5. Hey, it's only been a day!

I mean, he's got more important things to do! Like having a power lunch with the execs at Gold man sacks! I'm sure in a few day/weeks they'll have it all pretty and smooth.

:sarcasm:

[leeroysphitz]

3. Acknowledging our contributions would have meant at least pretending to care about our issues. n/t

[CaliforniaPeggy]

11. You got that right! n/t

[City of Mills]

4. Maybe they made the page with MS FrontPage 2003

Would you like frames or no frames? :)

[ecstatic]

17. I still love frontpage! nt

[xchrom]

6. recommend

[Armstead]

7. Sounds like the online equivalent of "Voicemail Hell"

You know, when you call someplace and have to go through convoluted lists of numbers, and if no one is there to answer they bounce you around to other dead ends or back to where you started in an endless loop -- when all you wanted was to talk to an actual person.

[JTFrog]

8. Cool story bro. n/t

[pulledpork]

9. Have you tried Google Chrome?

I quit using Firefox because it was rife with problems. I don't mean to dwell on that one point, because your larger one (to the tune of $100K) is much more important. I just hope they resolve this with you soon, whatever the case may be.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

40. Makes sense, both IE and Chrome come from where God intended products to come from.

i.e., big corporations.

Firefox, OTOH, is a commie-collective-kumbaya thing. It makes Nordic Baby Jesus cry.

[pulledpork]

60. Why the sarcasm?

My recommendation was sincere, and borne of practicality. I am not interested in a flame war about browsers, or making their usage an ideological statement.

My problem with Firefox was just that it didn't work for me, even though I wanted it to. Too many times it froze up on me, or wouldn't properly install (or subsequently recognize) plug-ins. It wasn't this way until the last 2 or 3 updates. Before then, I had much success using it.

I don't like IE for its many bugs and security holes. I haven't used it in many years, using Netscape back in the 90's before it became bogged down with its own problems, then only briefly did I use IE untiil Firefox came along.

I only recommended Chrome for the simple, practical reason that it has worked, free of freezes, bugs, and other glitches for a long time now. It was an effort to help Skinner with his concerns. Why you think this merits sarcasm and implications that I am some kind of corporate kiss-up, I have no clue. I have no agenda, other than to offer helpful advice, free of ideological baggage.

Peace.

[AsahinaKimi]

73. I use Opera. I really do like it..

Just wondering if anyone else uses it?

[pulledpork]

74. I haven't used that

I did some website testing as a temp last year, and found out that Safari had lots of issues with our site, ironically on a Mac of all things (banners would overlap the text, etc). This is where most of my opinions stated above are based - not just at-home use, but professionally too.

I will stress that everything I stated is based on a combination of professional/personal experience, but by NO MEANS indicative of a Universal Truth, nor the be-all or end-all of findings. :-)

Thanks for the Opera rec. I will keep that in a mind as a potential alternative.

[gratuitous]

10. Let us know which ticket he's running on

Yeah, I know:

:spank:

[Poll_Blind]

12. I think right now they're just starting to hit the really, really big fundraisers and I....

...thought that started with people who were able to raise over $350k. I read that here on DU someplace, about the big fundraisers getting a call in the last week or two and saying that the new "bar" was around $350k. If you didn't get on a "list" of some sort or even get recognized back in 2008, I'm a little surprised but then again it gets into huge, huge amounts of money.

You'd kind of think for that kind of help you'd get boilerplate "Thank You" note with a real signature- that kind of thing. From a politically-agnostic standpoint, I recall Bush Sr. being insane with the boilerplate "Thank You" notes w/real sig way down the donation chain. I hate him, but I thought that was a nice or at least effective "touch" for fundraisers.

PB

[Skinner]

18. To be fair, my post is written in a moment of temporary exasperation.

The inability to use the contact form through Firefox is really amateurish. And I really did happen to stumble across my 2008 request for a thank-you. I thought that was a somewhat humorous additional piece that happened to reinforce the overall point.

But I want to be clear: I am 100% on board with President Obama in 2012.

My purpose in posting this (other than to hopefully provide a little mirth) is to maybe prod the Obama campaign to fix these problems sooner rather than later. I'm on board no matter what. But I don't think they do themselves any favors if their "Contact Us" form doesn't work for 30% of their visitors, or if their 2008 fundraisers can't use the same "slug" they used in 2012.

[Poll_Blind]

23. Understood, I didn't read any or attempt to inject any evaluation. n/t

PB

[NightWatcher]

13. no need for "the little people" (100K), The Grassroots have become Kiss-my-ass-roots

Thanks to Citizens United, He only needs to woo or pay attention to millionaires, billionaires, and HUGE corporations.

He doesnt need us anymore

[KoKo]

14. Interesting the glitch now. More interesting is that you (DU) never got a thank you

for 2008.

Especially interesting since every time I've donated a teeny sum to DU, I get a prompt thank you from DU in my e-mail. Even when DU became huge...I still get a "Thank You."

Guess $110,000 just doesn't mean as much to political candidates as it used to. Still, a personal Thank You means a lot and says much about those soliciting the funds. Not Good..

BTW: Have you asked Markos if he ever got a "Thank You" for Daily Kos contributions? That would be interesting to know.

[Skinner]

20. To be fair, I do not send out the DU thank-you postal-mail letters promptly.

But I do mail them eventually.

I believe the 2008 oversight was not deliberate. I assume good faith, and I suspect that someone was not sufficiently organized and dropped the ball. My best guess -- and this is just a guess -- is that the website fundraisers and the real-world fundraisers were not really in contact with each other. Our donation total existed on some web server somewhere, but nobody bothered to check their totals and nobody knew. (The phone call should have been a tip. I sure felt like the person I spoke to was blowing me off. Maybe they were getting inundated with people claiming to have raised money and their reaction to unsolicited calls claiming to have raised $100,000 was "yeah, right.")

[KoKo]

26. I certainly wasn't implying that the "oversight" was deliberate

and hope you didn't take it that way. BTW: When DU was smaller (early 2000's) you DID send prompt thank you's. (I've been here since 2001). However, to be fair, I lumped together your earlier "prompt Thank You's" with the latest (now that DU is so much larger) which do tend to come somewhat later. :D

The point is...You Don't Forget..or Overlook the Thank You's for donating.

[Autumn]

15. You never liked him to begin with.

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:


Just kidding:hide:

[ecstatic]

16. That's awful...! nt

[Whisp]

19. seriously? your ego overtakes the importance of electing a democrat?

skinner,....

o geeze

[Skinner]

25. I think you may be reading more into this than I intended.

In case anyone here doesn't know, I am 100% on board with President Obama in 2012. His campaign could send me an email telling me to go f--- myself, and I would still be on board.

As someone who would like to see him win in 2012, I think having a website that actually works, and having a fundraising staff that thanks people, would both be good things.

[Whisp]

32. yes, apologies to you Skinner

my post was a bit rough and undeserving.

just that I think there are too many people here that feed off negative things about Obama and your post might get them a bit too excited, if you know what I mean.

[russspeakeasy]

54. I don't feed off of them. But I would like to see the President with a competent communications staf

Not saying anything when the rethugs come up with mean
spirited bullshit budgets and policies and our President's
staff thinking that "people will understand", is
bullshit, or demented. 
The Gary Cooper image was successful 60 years ago. Today the
communications, or lack thereof, may not be better, but it is
faster.
Today, when people bash you, take a deep breath and bash back
so they don't continue to do it.
Someone calls the President names and his only defense is Ed
Schultz !!

[Whisp]

61. I'm glad you got the phlegm out

feel better now?

you should apply to the administration and straighten them all out!

[Skinner]

55. It's okay.

I understand.

[Wait Wut]

57. Rahm doesn't work there anymore...

...so we don't have to worry about the "go f--- yourself" emails, but I agree 100% with your 100% support and raise it 100%.

It's going to get awfully noisy around here, though.

[Renew Deal]

21. The site is significantly different than the old one.

The only part of the site where you can "log in" is fundraising. I agree that the site isn't right yet.

[whatchamacallit]

22. You'd think someone in that camp would recognize you as an important ally

You deserve better. Hopefully it's just a glitch and they'll figure it out. As for me, I honestly don't care if he's reelected or not.

[lumberjack_jeff]

24. Skinner, you know we love you right?

Take this from a friend. This post comes off as a little...

Let's put it this way, the actual donors would probably prefer to be treated a little less parenthetically.

[Skinner]

28. I was going for "exasperated and mildly humorous" with a dash of legitimate concern.

I did not intend to disrespect all those DUers who support President Obama, and donated to him in 2008.

[lumberjack_jeff]

31. We know you didn't.

Writing is tricky. It's easy to miss the mark. :hi:

[Shagbark Hickory]

27. Try writing your letters on BP letterhead. nt

[pmorlan1]

35. Good Idea

Maybe using GE letterhead would work even better.

[truedelphi]

45. My laugh of the morning. Thank you. n/t

[Raine]

69. or Goldman Sachs nt

x(

[Bluebear]

71. !!!

[Shining Jack]

72. I second that. n/t

[Autumn]

29. Have you thought of giving that kind of money

to Democrats down ticket? If we can get more Democrats down ticket we all benefit. It seems to me Obama already has a huge war chest and he's going to win anyway.

[tallahasseedem]

30. Seriously Skinner...

now is not the time. Many of us here on DU could use a break from the constant President Obama bashing. In fact, I think many of us would appreciate a "Echo Chamber" forum as to escape it. I'm not kidding...

[JTFrog]

37. +1 n/t

[Flubadubya]

33. I just got an e-mail from Barack Obama today titled "2012"

Here's the content...

Flubadubya --

Today, we are filing papers to launch our 2012 campaign.

We're doing this now because the politics we believe in does not start with expensive TV ads or extravaganzas, but with you -- with people organizing block-by-block, talking to neighbors, co-workers, and friends. And that kind of campaign takes time to build.

So even though I'm focused on the job you elected me to do, and the race may not reach full speed for a year or more, the work of laying the foundation for our campaign must start today.

We've always known that lasting change wouldn't come quickly or easily. It never does. But as my administration and folks across the country fight to protect the progress we've made -- and make more -- we also need to begin mobilizing for 2012, long before the time comes for me to begin campaigning in earnest.

As we take this step, I'd like to share a video that features some folks like you who are helping to lead the way on this journey. Please take a moment to watch:


(embedded video here)

In the coming days, supporters like you will begin forging a new organization that we'll build together in cities and towns across the country. And I'll need you to help shape our plan as we create a campaign that's farther reaching, more focused, and more innovative than anything we've built before.

We'll start by doing something unprecedented: coordinating millions of one-on-one conversations between supporters across every single state, reconnecting old friends, inspiring new ones to join the cause, and readying ourselves for next year's fight.

This will be my final campaign, at least as a candidate. But the cause of making a lasting difference for our families, our communities, and our country has never been about one person. And it will succeed only if we work together.

There will be much more to come as the race unfolds. Today, simply let us know you're in to help us begin, and then spread the word:

http://my.barackobama.com/2012

Thank you,

Barack

[nc4bo]

41. Har. I got one too but Hotmail says it's it looks "very suspicious" so

they took it upon themselves to block "attachments, pictures and links" for my safety. (wonder if they'll be doing the same for the Repub. candidates?!)

:rofl::rofl:

Toxic campaign?! :rofl:

Oy vey.

[pmorlan1]

34. Maybe all of the problems are yet another sign...

I won't say what it might be a sign of because you have expressed 100% support for Obama and I don't want to go off topic.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

36. sounds frustrating. also, probably should be in the lounge

if you are looking for sympathy :)

[Bluenorthwest]

38. Good to call out the glitches...

I bet you guys hear about every little thing that ever goes less than perfectly on DU. And I bet that it is annoying but also helpful. I could be wrong.

[Skinner]

39. I would be hard-pressed to use the words "perfect" and "DU" in the same sentence.

I feel like our current software is basically just a collection of glitches held together with chewing gum and duct tape.

Yes, it is helpful to know about glitches. (Although it is annoying if the complaint includes an accusation of bad-faith, which my OP does. Unfairly, I admit. My insinuation that a random website glitch was some kind of personal affront is absurd.)

[Jamastiene]

65. Ahem.

We disagree on that. As far as the software goes, DU has the best layout and functions the best (overall) of any forum out there. Sure, there are problems on days with heavy traffic and sometimes there are errors, but most of the time, it works fine.

I'll be the first to admit that if I could "steal" the codes to tweak the DC Forum software to look and function like DU, I would do it in a heartbeat, to start my own animal/nature related forum. Otherwise, that idea is a no-go. Yes, I'm horrible for that, but I can't help it. I do love the look of this forum and the "fully threaded" format is hard to find without paying an arm and a leg for it. Even then, most of the "fully threaded" software out there looks like a jumbled mess. DU is very neat and very easy to read.

Then again, there may be lots of stuff going on behind the scenes (that I don't know about) to make it run smoothly. Still, you'll get no complaints from me when it comes to the DU software. To be honest, my friends get sick of hearing me talk about how much I like the look of DU, as the best looking fully threaded forum I've ever seen.

I was actually hoping you would offer a "Classic DU" layout preference for members when DU3 launches for those of us who have grown to love this current layout so much. I don't know if that will be possible though. If it is, please do. Pretty please.

As far as places that require you to use Internet Explorer, I just found one tonight on the Scoop Away web site. That is always such a huge PITA to me. My cats us Scoop Away and I used to love their plastic buckets because they are re-usable and easy to recycle for multiple purposes. The cardboard boxes? Not so much. I wanted to ask them to un-ass the cardboard crap boxes and go back to the plastic buckets. I typed my questions and all my personal information except my blood type (which they, thankfully, did not ask, although I was beginning to wonder) only to find there was no submit button on the page. I was using my regular Firefox (with Foxscape). I opened the same page in Internet Explorer and lo and behold, there was that missing submit button. I copied my questions and filled out all my personal information AGAIN and hit Submit. Success. Yes, that is annoying to the nth degree.

[Myrina]

42. Wow, sounds alot like how the last 3 years have gone ...

... and is probably a really good indicator of what Obama Administration 2.0 is going to run like, too.

[TygrBright]

43. Sounds like they need a new web development/operations team.

I know some guys who run a really cool Democratic website. They should ask them for advice and maybe some references.

heheheheh....

Thanks for the story. We are in the theoretically-final stages of getting our site built (complex database functions have delayed things...) so I feelya here. You would really, really think that of all the functionalities they would test rigorously PRIOR to going live, the ability of people who want to GIVE THEM MONEY to find their own db records and set up new ones based on them would be in the top ten or thereabouts.

amusedly,
Bright

[Peacetrain]

44. Well lets hope you have better luck getting your emails answered there

than I did here :rofl:

[JTFrog]

47. Snap! n/t

[Skinner]

49. Touché. I walked into that one.

I guess President Obama can take comfort knowing that his organization is doing no worse than DU. :thumbsup:

[ismnotwasm]

46. Hopefully it will improve?

I don't plan on paying a whole lot of attention to the campaign for a few months. Unless something interesting happens. I suppose I'll have to volunteer more this time, since from what I read here they are many disaffected Democrats who won't be and since I want Obama reelected, I'll step up.

The activists Dems I've met mostly don't use DU, but that's no excuse for ignoring or overlooking a site as popular as this one.

[kag]

48. You are WAY more patient and forgiving than I am.

But I guess that's why I'm not running a massively popular website. :crazy:

[XemaSab]

50. If you're waiting for Obama to thank you, you're going to be waiting a long time

Hate to break it to you, Skin-man, but DU is supposedly the crazy, radical, Bill Ayers, fringe left, and for the Big O to acknowledge that we're a big part of his "base?" Well Rahm Emmanuel et al. would just CLUTCH THEIR PEARLS.

[cui bono]

51. Anyone who thinks that clearly hasn't read many posts here.

DU is not even left, let alone radical or fringe.

[Shining Jack]

70. +1 n/t

[russspeakeasy]

52. Yeah, just some kind of acknowledgment that people did work for him.

Not me, not again.

[Beacool]

53. A mere $100K? Blah, Billion Dollar Man doesn't need our pittance.

Sorry, couldn't help myself. The thought that anyone needs to raise a billion dollars to get himself reelected is sickening, regardless of who it is. That money could be put to so many better uses. Ditto for the money that will be raised by the Republicans to try to elect their candidate.

What democracy do we really have in this country? Before we continue to smugly tell the world how they should emulate us, we should reevaluate how we choose and elect our own candidates. This is the country where money talks and good intentions walk. Where electorate colleges, caucuses, super delegates, etc. rule. The whole process should be overhauled.

:(

[Skinner]

56. FOLLOW-UP -- I received a response from the campaign.

I have received an email response from the campaign. Very fast. Unfortunately my Internet connection for my laptop is down, and I can't seem to log in to my barackobama.com account from my phone. So I'll have to wait for Internet before I can log on and (hopefully) set up the DU fundraising page.

[ismnotwasm]

58. A spy!!

I knew it!

[rtassi]

59. Sounds like there could be a better use for that money .. 100k could feed

A few People since it's obvious no one in the WH is going too!

[bluestate10]

64. I want Skinner to set up the Obama campaign contribution site on DU

as fast as humanly possible. DU has run one contribution fund for supplying food banks. Next time there is a fund for hunger, contribute.

[madrchsod]

62. wow...how much does a thank you cost?

i think we can find better use for our money. he sure in the hell does`t need it.

[mopinko]

63. if it makes you feel any better, i had similar problems

with an obscure browser called safari. that's what i get for being an applehead.

everything worked fine with the invite to the $100/250 per ticket fundraiser.

[SoCalDem]

66. "Hello, my name is Peggy"..

:rofl:

[quinnox]

67. No official thank you for 100 thousand dollars??

Jesus, that is disgusting. I guess they (The Obama team) consider anything below a million dollars chicken feed and unworthy of notice.

[lonestarnot]

68. Fucking A. Someone stole the keys.

[madmax]

75. K&R