It has the capability to be more accurate, but it also has the capability to be tremendously flawed, as this article shows. The thing about a pen and paper is that you don't need to worry about some hotshot developer accidentally introducing some minor bug and messing it all up.
The best idea, I think, is for modularity. The voting booth should produce a machine and human readable slip of paper, which would ensure people only voted for who they wanted to. From there, the ballots could be read by a machine which would be isolated again, and would give a human and machine readable result. Finally, those confirmed numbers would be entered into a database which would track each addition manually, and the paper produced by the counting machine would have an ID number on it and would be stored, in case of a disagreement.
No system is as foolproof as that could be. The ballots could be created in a program written in any programming language made in the last 20 years, the reader could be a standard PC hooked up to a high speed scanner, and the data could be a standard database, storing results and the ID number of the result sheet (individual ballots could have ID numbers independantly created by the standalone voting machines using a hierarchial system, if needed), and in the end, all of it is extremely human readable and verifyable.
"Oh SJ, you don't know anything about compootars! E-Voting is t3h futur3!" they say? Well I guess not.
E-voting is blatantly stupid. It's trying to solve problems that don't need multi-million dollar automation projects with multi-million dollar projects. If you've got problems with chads, don't use chads. Instead of complicated voting machines, give the voters a pencil and a piece of paper with the names of the candidates, and a box to check off the person they want to vote for. It's how we did things here in the last election, it's secret, and you don't have to debug a horribly complex process just to figure out how many people voted. Even better, it's a lot harder to tamper with a piece of paper with a big "X" on it than it is to alter a packet, or swap voting software for a hacked alternative, or do one of a thousand things that computer security experts fear.
I swear, people need to stop thinking that "High Tech" is an answer to all, or even most, of lifes problems. Tools have their place, and sometimes the old ways are the best ways.
Obviously, the moderator who modded me hasn't ever owned an S3. As a former owner of both an S3 ViRGE GX and a Savage4, I can tell you things as they really are.
Why does pointing out that Microsoft doesn't want linux on it's x-box have to be construed as anti-microsoft? Of course they don't want it there! It's a terrible PR blow. It's a simple fact. Whether you blame ms for it is really what makes it anti-ms or not. Do you think it's unreasonable? I don't. That doesn't change the fact that they don't want them there, or the fact that this very well could be a step towards ensuring the x-box doesn't remain a cheap linux box.
Women are different in many ways from male gamers in many ways, including the fact that they hold tradition and social standing in higher regard. Diamonds, marriages, all these things point to a higher bar for entry with female gamers, because a game will have to become a cultural phenomenon for many women to even bother taking a look. Compare this to men, who see killing, and go "uh. Me see kill. Me want kill." and start playing.
I think you've missed the hidden subtext of my message; I personally had to buy a new keyboard after my K6-2 which I got rid of only a few years ago, and I decided to get another one about a year ago because it was a USB keyboard with a built-in passive hub which is a thing of beauty when I want to use the sliding keyboard drawer on my desk, or, for that matter, any usb part that I don't want to have to plug in the back of my machine.
It's not like I go out and buy a new one every time it gets cruddy, but it's also not like the finish on the keyboard is nessessarily so easy to remove. I've used my laptop for probably millions of hours over the years, and it still has it's finish on th enter key (the arrow keys are another deal altogether).
I wish I could still have my IBM, but it croaked on me, quite thoroughly. Even things designed to last die eventually.:(
Becaue s3tc was good technology. The savage4 was not. The Ford Pinto no doubt had some interesting technological innovations, but that doesn't mean it's a good car.
S3 has never had a good card. Ever. If you think they did, it's because you hadn't used another card at the time. They all suck, are cheap, are worthless, and have bad drivers.
Let's sum up, shall we?
Pre-3d cards:Sucked, cheap, worthless. ViRGE:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers,ugly rendering. ViRGE DX:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering. ViRGE GX:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering. ViRGE DX/2,GX/2:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering. Trio GX2/DX2:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering. Savage3D:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers. Savage4:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers. Savage2000:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, useless T&L.
Nvidia, on the other hand...their drivers are so bad even in the Windows area that half the Windows games I used to play don't even display properly (parts of characters or objects missing, less than 30 fps, etc).
There must have been something seriously wrong with your setup, either on your PCs side, or on the video cards side. I've been running nvidias for years now, on a wide variety of hardware and software platforms, and I've never had the slightest problem with their software. The biggest problem I ever had was the fact that MSI mucked up their BIOS, so I had to reflash it later on because the video-out was messed up.
The phrase "rabit open source nuts" is made only more hilarious by the fact that many "open source nuts" are seemingly afraid of water. Considering that many large companies have fountains in their lobbies, I wonder how much good they would be at pushing companies into providing Linux support...
Please tell me why drivers, which by all accounts should simply jet textures, T&L info, and shader info off to their respective memory locations, could possibly make a company uncompetitive -- especially when they are selling me a chunk of silicon, rather than some piece of software? If it's because it could betray info on patents and such, I think that someone at ATI has a decent microscope if they REALLY want to learn how NVidias chips are made, and they also have a set of drivers of their own, as shocking and scandalous as it may sound...
No, ironic as in acting as if you're better than everyone while the point of your message is ironically an appeal to the very bourgois you claim to be above, and also ironically, it's an appeal so you might achieve success in a system designed entirely to attract the favour of the bourgois.
No they weren't, you ignoramus. In fact, I doubt they got much further than suborbital flight. Space is a challenge to be conquered in baby steps, though granted, the baby steps can happen a lot quicker for the Chinese, who can use space-age materials and pre-established research.:)
It's funny that you think you own that copy. You've liceowned it. All the bad parts of ownership, combined with all the bad parts of licensing.
What's funny to me is that DRM on digital music is supposed to be so limiting, but in reality, it's no different than the legal quagmire that is the CD you "own".
He did fight for it. He was a well decorated soldier. He had to watch his freinds get gunned down -- one of them he was joking with one minute, and the next minute his head was gone.
He fought for Freedom. He lost it anyway. There is no justice in the world.
I'm related to one of the soldiers too, and he died bitter because he got back from the war, and slowly discovered that the freedom he fought for was nowhere to be found.
You did? Strage. I could have sworn the Yanks were busy fighting a war against the japanese at the time, and that the war was almost won before Perl harbour. Silly me.
On the other hand, I think that both of us civilians(and I'm assuming you're a civilian here, seeing as I have no evidence to the contrary) talking about this is insensitive and stupid. If we went to war tomorrow against some new (credible, this time!) threat, it wouldn't be you or I, or George or Jean, or even Saddam doing the fighting, it would be the brave soldiers who are caught up in a blaze of international politics. In my eyes, they're the only ones who should be allowed to gloat about the acievements of their countries in war, and I'm not so certain they'd be willing.
I said it before, and I'll say it once again. This is for the last time, by the way, so try to keep an ear open in that ignorant mind of yours.
I am not OCG's other account. I am merely a well-wisher who likes the message of sanity he spreads. I also like how ignorant, easily manipulated fools like yourself get all riled up by this message.
I like how he says Linux has weaknesses; It does. Only zealots and idiots think otherwise, because developers know this, and are working their asses off towards fixing it.
I like how he says not every MS product is flawed. They aren't. For example, if you turn off file sharing on Windows 2000, set decent passwords and patch things up, it's a nice and secure OS that actually runs the software I own.
I like how he records the results of his "trolling" in his journal. It sounds less like gloating, and more like a scientific journal, IMHO. I read it with fascination, because about a year or two ago, I too realized the detrimental effects slashdot had, and took several steps afterwards.
When I came back, Slashdot had lost much of the allure it held over me, and I was able to see many places where "trolls" really did have a point, indeed the only sane point in the "arguement", that there's only a few reasons where it's moral, let alone legal, to download songs off the internet. If you think the RIAA is evil, don't listen to anything their member companies put out. If you think all IP should be free, you should go listen to free music. If you're in the "it's not Stealing, it's copyright infringement!" camp, I hope you didn't post in the recent "sco tries to steal all gpl'd code" threads, because it's the same damn thing, only on a larger scale, and substitituing "us' with "them".
Anyway, going back to the original point of this message, do yourself a favour. Take a walk, clear your head, and try to wrap your head around the idea that not everybody whose viewpoints differ from yours is either a "shill" or some vast conspiracy to make you personally look stupid, or some troll heist.
Furthermore, stop completely ignoring the posts were I actually disagree with OCG. It just makes you look stupid.
Slashdot Mirror
It has the capability to be more accurate, but it also has the capability to be tremendously flawed, as this article shows. The thing about a pen and paper is that you don't need to worry about some hotshot developer accidentally introducing some minor bug and messing it all up.
The best idea, I think, is for modularity. The voting booth should produce a machine and human readable slip of paper, which would ensure people only voted for who they wanted to. From there, the ballots could be read by a machine which would be isolated again, and would give a human and machine readable result. Finally, those confirmed numbers would be entered into a database which would track each addition manually, and the paper produced by the counting machine would have an ID number on it and would be stored, in case of a disagreement.
No system is as foolproof as that could be. The ballots could be created in a program written in any programming language made in the last 20 years, the reader could be a standard PC hooked up to a high speed scanner, and the data could be a standard database, storing results and the ID number of the result sheet (individual ballots could have ID numbers independantly created by the standalone voting machines using a hierarchial system, if needed), and in the end, all of it is extremely human readable and verifyable.
"Oh SJ, you don't know anything about compootars! E-Voting is t3h futur3!" they say? Well I guess not.
E-voting is blatantly stupid. It's trying to solve problems that don't need multi-million dollar automation projects with multi-million dollar projects. If you've got problems with chads, don't use chads. Instead of complicated voting machines, give the voters a pencil and a piece of paper with the names of the candidates, and a box to check off the person they want to vote for. It's how we did things here in the last election, it's secret, and you don't have to debug a horribly complex process just to figure out how many people voted. Even better, it's a lot harder to tamper with a piece of paper with a big "X" on it than it is to alter a packet, or swap voting software for a hacked alternative, or do one of a thousand things that computer security experts fear.
I swear, people need to stop thinking that "High Tech" is an answer to all, or even most, of lifes problems. Tools have their place, and sometimes the old ways are the best ways.
Obviously, the moderator who modded me hasn't ever owned an S3. As a former owner of both an S3 ViRGE GX and a Savage4, I can tell you things as they really are.
Why does pointing out that Microsoft doesn't want linux on it's x-box have to be construed as anti-microsoft? Of course they don't want it there! It's a terrible PR blow. It's a simple fact. Whether you blame ms for it is really what makes it anti-ms or not. Do you think it's unreasonable? I don't. That doesn't change the fact that they don't want them there, or the fact that this very well could be a step towards ensuring the x-box doesn't remain a cheap linux box.
How do idiots like you manage to open a web browser? I'm a CCNA; I think I know a thing or two about how the internet works.
Women are different in many ways from male gamers in many ways, including the fact that they hold tradition and social standing in higher regard. Diamonds, marriages, all these things point to a higher bar for entry with female gamers, because a game will have to become a cultural phenomenon for many women to even bother taking a look. Compare this to men, who see killing, and go "uh. Me see kill. Me want kill." and start playing.
OK, it's official. Democracy is officially worthless.
Sorry, I know how the internet works, and that's more than enough to convince me that nothing as important as voting should be done through it.
OK, it needs to get there correctly and quickly. How will it destroy nvidia if people know how they get it there correctly and quickly?
;)
And there are microscopes that can see individual atoms. I'm certain that 130NM wouldn't be a problem.
I think you've missed the hidden subtext of my message; I personally had to buy a new keyboard after my K6-2 which I got rid of only a few years ago, and I decided to get another one about a year ago because it was a USB keyboard with a built-in passive hub which is a thing of beauty when I want to use the sliding keyboard drawer on my desk, or, for that matter, any usb part that I don't want to have to plug in the back of my machine.
:(
It's not like I go out and buy a new one every time it gets cruddy, but it's also not like the finish on the keyboard is nessessarily so easy to remove. I've used my laptop for probably millions of hours over the years, and it still has it's finish on th enter key (the arrow keys are another deal altogether).
I wish I could still have my IBM, but it croaked on me, quite thoroughly. Even things designed to last die eventually.
Becaue s3tc was good technology. The savage4 was not. The Ford Pinto no doubt had some interesting technological innovations, but that doesn't mean it's a good car.
S3 has never had a good card. Ever. If you think they did, it's because you hadn't used another card at the time. They all suck, are cheap, are worthless, and have bad drivers.
Let's sum up, shall we?
Pre-3d cards:Sucked, cheap, worthless.
ViRGE:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers,ugly rendering.
ViRGE DX:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering.
ViRGE GX:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering.
ViRGE DX/2,GX/2:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering.
Trio GX2/DX2:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, ugly rendering.
Savage3D:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers.
Savage4:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers.
Savage2000:Sucked, cheap, worthless, bad drivers, useless T&L.
Any questions?
Nvidia, on the other hand...their drivers are so bad even in the Windows area that half the Windows games I used to play don't even display properly (parts of characters or objects missing, less than 30 fps, etc).
There must have been something seriously wrong with your setup, either on your PCs side, or on the video cards side. I've been running nvidias for years now, on a wide variety of hardware and software platforms, and I've never had the slightest problem with their software. The biggest problem I ever had was the fact that MSI mucked up their BIOS, so I had to reflash it later on because the video-out was messed up.
The phrase "rabit open source nuts" is made only more hilarious by the fact that many "open source nuts" are seemingly afraid of water. Considering that many large companies have fountains in their lobbies, I wonder how much good they would be at pushing companies into providing Linux support...
Please tell me why drivers, which by all accounts should simply jet textures, T&L info, and shader info off to their respective memory locations, could possibly make a company uncompetitive -- especially when they are selling me a chunk of silicon, rather than some piece of software? If it's because it could betray info on patents and such, I think that someone at ATI has a decent microscope if they REALLY want to learn how NVidias chips are made, and they also have a set of drivers of their own, as shocking and scandalous as it may sound...
It happens. Espcially when you replace your keyboard more than once every five years.
You wouldn't be running a pentium classic by any chance, would you?
Can you feel the love? I know I can. It feels like bullets and killer bee venom.
No, ironic as in acting as if you're better than everyone while the point of your message is ironically an appeal to the very bourgois you claim to be above, and also ironically, it's an appeal so you might achieve success in a system designed entirely to attract the favour of the bourgois.
I love it when people try to appeal to the Slashdot bourgeois. Depending on your point of view, it's either ironic, or pointless.
No they weren't, you ignoramus. In fact, I doubt they got much further than suborbital flight. Space is a challenge to be conquered in baby steps, though granted, the baby steps can happen a lot quicker for the Chinese, who can use space-age materials and pre-established research. :)
Because SCOs lawyers have so much to be proud of...
It's funny that you think you own that copy. You've liceowned it. All the bad parts of ownership, combined with all the bad parts of licensing.
What's funny to me is that DRM on digital music is supposed to be so limiting, but in reality, it's no different than the legal quagmire that is the CD you "own".
He did fight for it. He was a well decorated soldier. He had to watch his freinds get gunned down -- one of them he was joking with one minute, and the next minute his head was gone.
He fought for Freedom. He lost it anyway. There is no justice in the world.
I'm not european, so there you go.
I'm related to one of the soldiers too, and he died bitter because he got back from the war, and slowly discovered that the freedom he fought for was nowhere to be found.
You did? Strage. I could have sworn the Yanks were busy fighting a war against the japanese at the time, and that the war was almost won before Perl harbour. Silly me.
On the other hand, I think that both of us civilians(and I'm assuming you're a civilian here, seeing as I have no evidence to the contrary) talking about this is insensitive and stupid. If we went to war tomorrow against some new (credible, this time!) threat, it wouldn't be you or I, or George or Jean, or even Saddam doing the fighting, it would be the brave soldiers who are caught up in a blaze of international politics. In my eyes, they're the only ones who should be allowed to gloat about the acievements of their countries in war, and I'm not so certain they'd be willing.
I said it before, and I'll say it once again. This is for the last time, by the way, so try to keep an ear open in that ignorant mind of yours.
I am not OCG's other account. I am merely a well-wisher who likes the message of sanity he spreads. I also like how ignorant, easily manipulated fools like yourself get all riled up by this message.
I like how he says Linux has weaknesses; It does. Only zealots and idiots think otherwise, because developers know this, and are working their asses off towards fixing it.
I like how he says not every MS product is flawed. They aren't. For example, if you turn off file sharing on Windows 2000, set decent passwords and patch things up, it's a nice and secure OS that actually runs the software I own.
I like how he records the results of his "trolling" in his journal. It sounds less like gloating, and more like a scientific journal, IMHO. I read it with fascination, because about a year or two ago, I too realized the detrimental effects slashdot had, and took several steps afterwards.
When I came back, Slashdot had lost much of the allure it held over me, and I was able to see many places where "trolls" really did have a point, indeed the only sane point in the "arguement", that there's only a few reasons where it's moral, let alone legal, to download songs off the internet. If you think the RIAA is evil, don't listen to anything their member companies put out. If you think all IP should be free, you should go listen to free music. If you're in the "it's not Stealing, it's copyright infringement!" camp, I hope you didn't post in the recent "sco tries to steal all gpl'd code" threads, because it's the same damn thing, only on a larger scale, and substitituing "us' with "them".
Anyway, going back to the original point of this message, do yourself a favour. Take a walk, clear your head, and try to wrap your head around the idea that not everybody whose viewpoints differ from yours is either a "shill" or some vast conspiracy to make you personally look stupid, or some troll heist.
Furthermore, stop completely ignoring the posts were I actually disagree with OCG. It just makes you look stupid.