Project Orca: How an IT Disaster Destroyed Republicans' Get-Out-The-Vote Effort

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Project Orca: How an IT Disaster Destroyed Republicans' Get-Out-The-Vote Effort

Posted by Soulskill on Friday November 9, 2012 @09:22AM from the whale-of-a-campaign-killer dept.

cheesecake23 writes "Many talking heads have attributed Obama's success to an unmatched 'ground game.' Now, inside reports from campaign volunteers suggest that Project Orca, a Republican, tech-based voter monitoring effort with 37,000 volunteers in swing states, turned out to be an epic failure due to dismal IT. Problems ranged from state-wide incorrect PINs, to misleading and delayed information packets delivered to volunteers, to a server outage and missing redirection of secure URLs."

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Demographics and the Republican Party by AMCandel · 2012-11-09 09:28 · Score: 5, Funny

Looks like all his competent IT people self-deported to the other campaign?
The real problem is 37,000 GOTV for several states by jbeach · 2012-11-09 09:36 · Score: 4, Funny

The Obama campaign probably had that many people in Ohio just getting the coffee.

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The Invisible Hand of the Free Market is what punches workers in the nuts.
Must have been God's will. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-09 09:36 · Score: 5, Funny

After all in the case of legitimate server outage the internet has a way to repair itself
1. Re:Must have been God's will. by John3 · 2012-11-09 09:56 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Actually in situations like this the internet has a way to shut that whole thing down.
  
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  "We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers." Carl Sagan
Quote by cheesecake23 · 2012-11-09 09:38 · Score: 5, Funny

I forgot to add this great tweet by the author of the final story linked in TFS when I submitted this to Slashdot:

Long story short: Don't beta-test an election.
1. Re:Quote by hamburger+lady · 2012-11-09 09:45 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  now, imagine these guys running FEMA.
  yikes.
  
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  Is this the MPAA? Is this the RIAA? Is this the DMCA? I thought it was the USA!
2. Re:Quote by dkleinsc · 2012-11-09 10:01 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  One might wonder what would have happened if the Romney campaign had had an experienced business manager with an MBA from a prestigious university leading them.
  
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  I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
Re:Serves them right by strength_of_10_men · 2012-11-09 11:12 · Score: 4, Funny

To paraphrase a Fox News anchor:
Are these the facts that you cite as a Republican to make yourself feel better or is this real?
Re:Serves them right by Maow · 2012-11-09 11:19 · Score: 4, Funny

Seriously, this place has turned into such a lapdog to the Democratic Party that I can't stand to read it anymore.
Mod me down. I don't give a fuck. This is my last slashdot post.
And the quality of Slashdot just went up.
Re:Serves them right by Daetrin · 2012-11-09 11:40 · Score: 5, Funny

As someone said on twitter:

"The Rape guy lost" "Which one?" Your party has serious issues if people have to ask "Which one?"

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This Space Intentionally Left Blank
No news here... by billybob_jcv · 2012-11-09 13:48 · Score: 4, Funny

... IT gets blamed for everything.