I agree. As someone else mentioned, Ohio's ballot is also not very easy to decipher. It is very obvious if you look at it long enough. (I voted with it.) People should pay attention if they are concerned with who they are voting for.
On the other hand the designers and evaluators of the balloting process have produced a product that is somewhat confusing and the attitude should not be that people need to pay attention. For example the layout of my phone bill is easier to make sense of than the Ohio or Florida ballot. Most web based forms are less visually ambiguous than the ballot in question.
The IRS has made progress in the area of form design, so it stands to reason that other parts of government could find it useful to get the help of designers with expertice in form design and the evaluation of those designs.
if anyone wants to see some of the observations we have regarding the ballot design it is on our website at http://www.sonicrim.com/red/us/ballot.html
Slashdot Mirror
I agree. As someone else mentioned, Ohio's ballot is also not very easy to decipher. It is very obvious if you look at it long enough. (I voted with it.) People should pay attention if they are concerned with who they are voting for. On the other hand the designers and evaluators of the balloting process have produced a product that is somewhat confusing and the attitude should not be that people need to pay attention. For example the layout of my phone bill is easier to make sense of than the Ohio or Florida ballot. Most web based forms are less visually ambiguous than the ballot in question. The IRS has made progress in the area of form design, so it stands to reason that other parts of government could find it useful to get the help of designers with expertice in form design and the evaluation of those designs. if anyone wants to see some of the observations we have regarding the ballot design it is on our website at http://www.sonicrim.com/red/us/ballot.html