ABC.com - Interactive fun, or Overwhelming?

Sara Nealeigh

Sn115009@ohio.edu    

nealeigh.s2010@gmail.com        

@saranealeigh

The last few years, the main focus of the political sphere has been the economy. Sure, you can make an argument for gay rights and other things, but what really has made up some of the heaviest content in election news has been the nation’s downturned economy.

ABCnews.com takes a look at the President Obama’s comment earlier this week about giving his work on improving the economy an “incomplete” with this article . 

The number of graphics and pictures containing links to other stories is somewhere close to suffocating, but keeps the site interactive. (Screen shot of abcnews.com/politics.)

At first glance, the ABC.com Politics tab doesn’t look like anything spectacular. It has the general build of a news organization website; a slideshow box, major headlines, some pictures of important faces and names with links to their opinions or shows, but the further you scroll, the more you see.

If you’re someone who likes to take in information quickly and don’t mind looking at pictures, then ABC has the political coverage for you. The site has more graphics, pictures and videos than a teenager’s Tumblr page.

On Tuesday night, following the Democratic National Convention, the website had graphics showing the candidates current favorability with the public, infographics on the National Conventions by the Numbers, and a graphic of the top Democrats that would not be in attendance of this year’s convention.

Most of the graphics and articles were heavily focused toward the Democratic convention and President Obama. ABC also provides links to their OTUS (Of The United States) coverage. There, one of the first things you see as you scroll down the page is a countdown box to the Democratic National Convention.  Scattered throughout the page, more so than on ABC’s Politics tab, are mentions of the Republican convention. While the breaking Democratic information is getting the headlines section, there is at least an attempt to include the Republican Party.

Banner of abcnews.com/politics/otus (Screenshot)    

Because both sites keep a “popularity stock market,” it will be interesting to see how the two sites differ in coverage, if at all, from now until the election.