Slashdot Mirror
E-Voting Problems Are Mostly User Error, Says ITAA
grcumb writes "InfoWorld is carrying a story today which mentions a press kit being distributed by the Information Technology Association of America. Its purpose? To 'help journalists put election equipment-related snafus in context.' Most e-voting problems, they insist, are [l]user issues, where people who don't know how to deal with the new technology cause delays as they seek assistance. They don't seem to feel the need for journalists to understand basic system design issues (like making sure your computer and human processes work), why testing didn't identify these problems, nor why this is better than paper ballots."
India, the worlds largest democracy recently had an all electronic voting. Thats a few hundred million voters. Isn't he USA one of the most educated countries in the world ? The highest distribution of luxury goods ? 99% of the voters has cable TV, whereas in india many voters see a monitor once every 5 years : when they vote.
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
I really think the old paper balots where the best bet. When I lived in New Hampshire you filled in a paper balot and they fed it into a machine to be counted. (Think SAT tests here). THe computer counted it, but if they had to I am sure that they could re-do it by hand.
It was easy, cheap and low tech. I really think much of this e-voting a solution looking for a problem.
Erlang Developer and podcaster
The ITAA is a lobbying arm of the big hardware/software corporations. They're the ones that keep issuing studies saying that there's a 'shortage' of American IT workers so the U.S. needs to bring in more H-1B's and outsource more. I'd say they have about as much credibility as certain other more well known *AA's.
[Insert pithy quote here]
As somebody who ran a polling station once, hand-counting is pretty damned easy. A couple thousand voters go to each polling centre, There's a half-dozen or so polling booths, that's only a few hundred votes to count.
You count them in front of a peer and volunteer party representatives. Then to be pedantic, your peer counts them again.
The count starts, of course, once the polls close.
If you think of the level of real patriotism left in the U.S., is it really that hard to find a school or public facility to vote in? Is it really that hard to find people to sit at the polls? Is it really that hard to find people to watch over and audit this process?
These electronic voting companies make it sound like voting is drudgery which nobody will volunteer to help with... there is no end of volunteers!
BTW, I've been told that there's at least one state, I don't recall which one, (Winconsin? Wyoming?, some "W" state I've never been to) which uses a similar system to that of Canada.