Evolution of the Democratic Party’s Website
After researching the evolution of the Democratic National Committee’s website (democrats.org) and comparing the content and design throughout the years, I have found that the greatest change within the website has only happened within the past 5 years. When the website was born in 1996, the design and content were very minimal, as to be expected. Interestingly enough, the website’s birth date came online only about a month after President Clinton was elected to office. From what I’ve seen on the Internet Archive, there have been eight design changes from its birth until the present day’s modern, interactive website.
From 1996 to 2008, there were only a few changes of the website designs. In 2000, a search engine was placed within the site. This can be explained by the birth of Google and other public search engines that were created around 1998 and became increasingly used by the public. In 2005, the website added a new blog addition in the page’s content that allowed users to be able to track different blogs of the Democratic Party. This addition of the blog tab was most likely due to the increasing popularity of blogs in the early 2000s and it has even continued to stay on the page in its different design. The “blog” tab still remains available on the present day website, but in a more interactive way.
In 2010, the website was completely restructured to be more appealing and interactive. The banner of the page displays a large, appealing “D” logo that still remains the logo for the Democratic Party. This is also when the first social media information such as Facebook and Twitter appeared on the page, which echoes the quick rise of these social media platforms and how even large companies and government officials felt it was important to jump on the bandwagon. Videos were suddenly available to watch on the Democratic Party’s website as well, which shows the evolution of interactivity within the web and how people, especially millennials, want a one stop shop with their websites. In 2013, the option to share articles and information became easily available, and with a click of a button, this website would post that article to your Facebook or Twitter timeline. This shows how different information mediums became interconnected and how quickly today’s new media became integrated into our world. As can be seen from the screenshot of the website in 2014, the new interactive page also began to feature graphics that showcased facts in an appealing fashion. This could suggest how modern people of the information age want their information quickly and are not delving into the larger articles the website might have. It is also interesting that the current website available now includes abbreviations and jargon that is popular to Millennials, such as “Dems” and “Factivists.” This could be because the majority of people who use and surf the web frequently are Millennials, or it could also just be because abbreviations and similar jargon has become a part of pop culture, so the Democratic Party is trying to seem modern and relatable.
Even though the changes from 2010 to 2015 are only minimal, this time frame shows us how monumental the shift in technology was during this era. Technology became widely available to the majority of America’s population, and how we wanted our information changed. The layout of the design changed as well as the content, which started to include social media aspects as well as many more visual aspects- showing that our society has become a very visual society who wants information quickly and in a one stop shop.
Design Changes from 1996-present
1996:
1998:
2000:
2002:
2004:
2005:
2010:
2013:
2014:
2015:
