As an airport obsessive, I was interested to learn that the TSA has a blog now. It’s a curious thing. For example, they’ve gone to some significant lengths to humanize the bloggers:
Hi, I’m Bob, and I started with the TSA in September 2002. … I live in Southwest Ohio with my wife, 3-year-old daughter, and a 100 pound German shepherd named Clarence. Prior to the TSA I was a singer songwriter and traveled the world with my band. Songwriting is now one of my hobbies along with record collecting and photography.
Users can leave comments, subject to moderation, although they appear to be letting through at least some of the critical comments. Here’s a fun one:
You guys are incredibly ineffective. My PEPPER SPRAY gets through on my key chain each and every single time but I’ve lost several hundred dollars worth of skincare items over the years since this government mandate began.
As someone fascinated by processes of all kinds, I’m curious to see what comes of it. I’m less interested in whether or not the blog changes TSA policy, and more interested in what Liz Losh describes as the rhetoric of government websites, and how this example makes those processes more public than they appear even when we are participating in them live.