For the uninitiated, a 404 page is what you see when trying to view a page on a website that doesn’t exist. By default they’re pretty boring error pages, but it’s easy to customise them. And it turns out a lot of the 2016 US presidential candidates have done so, to varying degrees of success. So, let’s review them!

Disclaimers:

• Being a Brit, I don’t know too much about American politics. Hence judging candidates based on 404 pages, rather than policies and track records and all that boring stuff.
• After I started writing this post, Google told me it had been done several times already. However those were all written about 6 months ago, when there was a sudden outbreak of interest among journalists. 6 months is an eternity in Internet time, and a few things have changed.
• I based my list of candidates off this one which was about the first that came up in Google. Apologies if your favourite is missed out. Also I think some have since dropped out because of the Iowa caucus thing.

Democrats

Hillary Clinton

Oh god, it’s a truly awful pun. Does include a photo showing Hillary as vaguely human, which is a plus. Interestingly contains Bill; I can never work out if he’s considered a positive or a negative by her campaign.

Wait a second… Bill! Did you really miss that chance to double down on the terrible duck puns? I mean in for a penny, in for a pound dollar, right?

Rocky De La Fuente

Don’t know who this is. Bad-ass name. Boring-ass 404 page. The most interesting thing here is the eccentric approach to capitalisation for the red text.

Martin O’Malley

All I know about this guy is that no-one thinks he can win. Oh, and that he has the BEST 404 PAGE! Just look at it, he’s on a horse, smiling and looking dapper. Look at his horse, his horse is amazing. There’s even an American flag in the background, and if I know one thing about US elections it’s that you need flags all over. Plus the text very nicely ties it in with the 404 error, and the call-to-action.

The only blot on this perfection is the green-shirted guy in the background. Not that I have anything against him, but he surely ought to be swooning at this magnificent sight.

Top marks, and my non-existent vote.

Bernie Sanders

Someone sharing this is what started it all. Great effort by Sanders recording a special video for the 404 page, and a nice message. Personally I find his voice kind of annoying (especially in such a loud, echoey room) but I’m not going to hold that against him.

Just praying this doesn’t start a trend of autoplaying videos on 404 pages though.

Republicans

Jeb! Bush

Do people still do “wat”? Nice use of amusing retro photo, even if it’s a bit tenuous. Disappointed you didn’t bother to translate the Spanish version; I really wanted to find out the Spanish equivalent of “wat”.

Ben Carson

Literally zero effort. Come on Ben, making a custom 404 page isn’t exactly brain surgery. Also, please sort out your weird mix of button styles in the top right.

Chris Christie

Damn you Bernie, you started a trend! Dancing means this has to be the weirdest one. I know even less about American comedians than about politicians, but I’m going to go out on a limb and assume Christie is the one on the right?

Props for being willing to embarrass yourself though – and make a reference to that weird bridge scandal which is basically the only reason I’ve ever heard of you. I suppose once you’ve done all this on national television, putting it on the 404 page of your website isn’t really a big deal.

Ted Cruz

Spoke too soon, we may have topped Chris Christie for weirdness. “Machine-Gun Bacon” – are you for real? That’s just trying way too hard to score Internet points. And it doesn’t tie in with the 404 at all… does “cooked” even make sense here?

Sidenote: “Of course in Texas…” – how can you tell someone’s from Texas? THEY TELL YOU ALL THE TIME. I don’t have a clue where any of the other candidates are from, except that Trump is from New York (because his tower is there). Oh, and Sanders is from Vermont possibly? That doesn’t count because I don’t have any idea where Vermont is. But the fact that Ted Cruz is from Texas has been inescapably drilled into me every time I’ve heard him speak.

Carly Fiorina

Oh Carly. “This person didn’t find what they were looking for, great time to straight up ask them for $$$!”

Your main selling point is that you ran a tech company, but you can’t manage a real 404 page? Disappointing.

Jim Gilmore

Don’t know who you are. You have a very boring 404 page. So boring I couldn’t be bothered to take a screenshot.

Mike Huckabee

Fishing and petting his dog, just like a normal everyday American human!

Not bad I suppose, although I’m a little baffled why anyone would be so desperate to print this page that they need a special button.

John Kasich

Well done, the Internet likes kittens. I hope you paid your online consultants good money for that amazing insight.

Not pictured, but if you must try and be ‘hip’ by having a snapchat button, please make it line up with all the other social media buttons.

Rand Paul

Not the best photo, and there are some alignment issues, but “Even the NSA couldn’t find that page” is probably the best joke out of all of these. Full marks for American flags too.

Marco Rubio

FOOTBALL COACHING!

Honestly, this video (I mean the one on the page, not Coach McGuirk obviously!) was nice, but kind of makes it sound like Rubio doesn’t actually want to be President. Leave the poor guy alone, let him be a father and football coach.

Rick Santorum

(Oh my god why are there so many Republican candidates! Feels like I’ve been looking at 404 pages for hours.)

I guess this is a dig at Hillary’s personal email server? Mmmm… negative campaigning. Well done, you’re not Hillary. Newsflash: nor are the people you’re competing against right now. Well executed though, I’ll give you that.

Donald Trump

Here’s a sentence you don’t read very often: I expected better from Donald Trump. Instead it’s just a standard, boring, 404 page.

Bonus potential candidate?

People keep talking about whether Michael Bloomberg could run. I don’t know much about his politics, but Bloomberg.com has a truly wonderful 404 page (and even a great custom 500 page) so here’s hoping!

Conclusions

Martin O’Malley is a king among men, and I have too much time on my hands.