Microsoft Moves To Change NY State Election Law

myspace-cn sends us to Bo Lipari's blog where it is revealed that Microsoft has moved forcefully into New York State with proposed changes to NY state election law drafted by Microsoft attorneys. A document has been circulating (PDF) among the legislators for a while now. The proposed changes would gut the source-code escrow and review provisions in current law that were hard-fought-for and passed in New York in 2005. Microsoft is siding with the makers of voting machines that run on Windows — the company doesn't want its code inspected by outsiders. From the article: "Now the software giant has gone a step further, not just saying 'we won't comply with your law' but actively trying to change state law to serve their corporate interests... Adding insult to injury, these changes are being slipped into a bill that may be voted on Monday or Tuesday, June 18 or 19."

Comments

Used car salesman

[sjames]

When the used car salesman if performing gymnastics to guide your eyes away from some aspect of the car, that's where you'd BETTER look if you don't want to be ripped off.

What we have here is a salesman who is desperate to keep us from examining the source of the OS.

Re:Wrong

[trolltalk.com]

"Could you name one issue where current law diverges from majority opinion, backed by some recent survey?"

Totally irrelevant to the issue at hand, which is that companies have more "access" to legislators than the electorate does.

Electoral laws need reform.

But since you asked - the current war in Iraq. Current law funds it - current public opinion is that the invasion was a mistake and to get out.

Another one - the deficit. Current law says its okay to run huge deficits, and to keep raising the legal deficit ceiling. public opinion is WTF

The debt ceiling was raised just over a year ago. It's going to have to be raised again in the VERY near future.

Ten trillion or bust? More like Ten trillion AND bust!

Re:Life, liberty, and the pursuit of blogs.

[BakaHoushi]

It sounds like the only way to solve America's growing problem of corporations taking over is... a good old fashioned rumble.

Microsoft v. Wal*Mart!
GE v. Disney!
Halliburton v. Exxon-Mobile!

This sunday, sunday, SUNDAY, watch white collar workers get red in the face and a bad case of the Mondays! Marketers place ads all OVEr each other's faces! Accountants will be adding up plenty of lumps!

And for the finale, Steve Ballmer v. Eisner! Hold on to your seats, because somebody is gonna get CEOwned!

That is why we should have stuck with paper ballot

[Attila Dimedici]

This is just one more reason we should have stuck with the paper ballot. Despite all the complaints about the 2000 election, there was a clear paper trail to follow. I do not believe that there is any way to make an electronic ballot that there is a way to make it so that the average person could be confident that the vote wasn't rigged. Even with open source software, unless you compiled the code yourself (or at least were present when it was compiled), how do you know that the "open" code is actually what they installed on the machine?