I'm not surprised the white house doesn't have these capabilities because they've never had to do it before Obama. Also security risk it can potentially create for whitehouse.gov. I'm sure nobody wants to look bad because a mailing list or mass text messenger service caused an exploit. So it think the process to create and integrate these features with whitehouse.gov will be a slow and costly process. But on the flipside the white house does have plenty of money (i.e. bailout) so they could use a private contractor's 3rd party solution. There are plenty mailing list and text messaging companies out there.

I actually like the direction that whitehouse.gov is going. Its predecessor Change.gov offered engaging online videos from internal meetings, exclusive blog posting, and responses to the latest media accusations. All of these things, for the most part, were carried over during the transition. Websites are always a work in progress, and adjustments must be made swiftly to keep the audience coming back.

This was an interesting article by the Post. But is it really a surprise that the government is prehistoric.

I miss the old whitehouse.gov site. used it quite a bit. now having to search around for the standards. plus the new site is too facebooky and not presidential enough for me.