Number 10 Goes Beta

Number 10 Downing Street recently launched a website, Number10.gov.uk,… in self-proclaimed beta! That’s a bit of a head scratcher: it’s not as though creating a website is so complicated that you’ve got to announce to the world that “We may not get this right, folks, the first time around, so stand by for patches…” And this for a site about the Prime Minister of the U.K.

There are some interesting things about the site, though, gamma or not. They’ve made considerable use of social media to keep things interesting and up-to-date: so you’ll see links to Number 10’s pics on Flickr (lovely garden shots — it is Britain, after all), its place on YouTube, and a river of news stories headed by a current video. There’s a feed, of course, and podcasts of the Prime Minister at question period.

These are good ideas for a staid institution bent on reaching a wider audience. But beta? Better for them to have had some fun and gone with the number 9. And to have quoted John Lennon:

Number nine, number nine, number nine,
number nine, number nine…

…one of life’s trippier experiences, whether played forwards or backwards.

All of which makes me wonder what we could do with Mr. Harper’s 24 Sussex Drive.