Tell HN: After the US gov shutdown, the Census data website was broken

The US Census data explorer (https://data.census.gov) is currently broken. A redirect with a warning message that "the website will not be updated due to the shutdown" was put in place at some point. Existing assets such as javascript assets are being redirected to this HTML page, thus breaking the entire website.

This tool is essential for researchers to access US population statistics. The modification in connection with the US government shutdown seems to have done more harm than any good it could have caused.

3 points | by NewJazz 20 hours ago

1 comments

  • dathinab 20 hours ago
    > seems to have done more harm than any good it could have caused.

    I guess this most likely was more a protest situation then anything else.

    Put putting on a tinfoil hat for a moment:

    what if that was the point?

    the current US government has repeatedly based reasoning around points directly contradicted by existing statistics, studies etc. some of them being "gone" seems to be more helpful then harmful for them. E.g. see how statistics and data about climate change collected by US organs seems to be increasingly hard to access. If that works why not also do it for crime statistics, population statistics etc.