Home > News & Policies > August 2001

For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
August 31, 2001

What's New on the White House Website

President George W. Bush and Mrs. Bush unveiled the new White House web site on Friday, August 31, 2001 in the Library of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.

The site features:

A vibrant design. While simple to navigate, it reflects the dignity and traditions of the White House.

Increased multimedia content. Text is now enhanced by more audio and video of Presidential events, speeches, press conference and press briefings.

The President's speeches. Statements, transcripts, nominations, proclamations and general news releases are posted rapidly to the site.

Improved search engine. The new search engine is designed to be user friendly by selecting documents which are most relevant to individual searches. Every document on the White House web site is now programmed with unique information (called a ‘meta-tag’) to improve the relevance of search results.

whitehousekids.gov (Kids site) Designed for elementary school children ages five to twelve and created with the assistance of teachers and schoolchildren, whitehousekids.gov is a good way for kids to learn about the White House, President and Mrs. Bush and the Administration.

Quick nominations link. Details on nominees for federal positions are among the most requested pieces of information.

Photo gallery. The White House photographers are among the best in the world. The new site features the work of these talented photographers, not only in the daily photographs, but in photo essays which are updated frequently.

Spanish content. Policies, radio addresses and other sections of the site have been translated to accommodate Spanish-speaking visitors.

Improved accessibility. For the sight-impaired, the web site is programmed so a voice synthesizer can read aloud the contents, including online forms and photo captions. For the hearing impaired, video of Presidential events will now be captioned and efforts are underway to encode previous video with captioning as well.