Tech revisionism?

This week the Washington Post reported on the frustration of new Obama Administration staffers at the state of technology in their new White House offices. Though the headline suggested the Bush Administration was in the “technological dark ages,” a careful reading suggested otherwise: workstations had desktops instead of laptops, and they all ran on Windows XP.

As Patrick Ruffini points out, the Obama online team is not necessarily in the moral authority to talk about tech issues, as updates to the shiny new whitehouse.gov have been slow in coming in the first days of the administration.

But beyond that, Craig Colgan reminds us that the Bush Administration pioneered the use of the internet to create an online White House presence – but the facts aren’t always enough:

“This White House was of course the first with a rigorous online presence. The contribution of the Bush administration in this regard will of course not be a part of the official narrative. How this all works is no surprise. The reigning meme out there goes like this: When Republicans get it right online, and/or do it well, then it doesn’t matter. Or doesn’t matter anymore.”