Shutdown blacks out U.S. Census site

by John Seiler | October 7, 2013 1:58 pm

It's taken a week, but I finally was affected by the federal government “shutdown” (which actually only closes, temporarily, 17 percent of the government; leaving 83 percent still operating[1]).

I went to the U.S. Census's Web site, census.gov[3], and got this screen:

[4]

I could understand why they wouldn't put up new data, such as the unemployment numbers that were scheduled for last Friday. But why take down the whole site?

When I go to sleep, I don't take down CalWatchDog.com.

Did the Census stop paying its servers? Then why is the notice still up? Shouldn't there just be that “NOT FOUND” error message?

All I know is that, although I find the Census numbers valuable, I have other ways of getting data. They could shut it down permanently and it wouldn't crimp my work, especially if the money saved was refunded by cutting my taxes.

But it's obvious that the notification is just another nuisance intended to annoy people so they call for funding the government. With me, it had the opposite effect.

Endnotes:

83 percent still operating: http://washingtonexaminer.com/wheres-sense-of-crisis-in-a-17-percent-government-shutdown/article/2536862
computer softwares: http://thebestcomputersoftware.com/
census.gov: http://census.gov
[Image]: http://calwatchdog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Census-shutdown-notice.jpg

Source URL: https://calwatchdog.com/2013/10/07/shutdown-blacks-out-u-s-census-site/