I'm a sucker for cool looking visualisations (as Wired's InfoPorn section used to champion). Ones that are useful are even better of course.
Michael Gastner, Cosma Shalizi, and Mark Newman from the University of Michigan have distorted maps of the US according to state populations to give us a better idea of how the votes were distributed and it really is quite stunning.
Via WorldChanging
Like the election result this is totally unbelievable… Colour laser printers add microscopic traceable numbers to each print they deliver. This 'feature' is aimed at preventing counterfeiting. I just wonder what other kinds of printers, scanners, photocopiers have such undisclosed tracking systems?
Article on IT World via EDRI-gram
In other news an independent audit of the Irish e-voting system will be undertaken. It's not clear what will happen with the results or what kind of tests will actually be done. Still it shows how far the pressure has made the Irish government go to try and shore up confidence in e-voting.
Article in The Times via EDRI-gram
Now these guys really wanted to vote… that's dedication.
For a change from the US election fever, a couple of reports from Europe…
France has been taking a softly, softly approach to e-voting. Most recently they've piloted a system (developed by EADS oddly enough) for use in professional elections.
The E-POLL project has run a pilot in Italy and another is due in France soon. It's led by Siemens (where are the companies who know about voting in all these projects?!?!) and incredibly buzz-word compliant. I quote ” Its main concept is the re-engineering of the entire voting processes using cutting edge technologies such as wi-fi, intranet, smartcards, biometrics, and GPRS.” Great.
Boing Boing has two good posts on voting problems in the US of A.
Reader Brian Nicks had a bona fide error when voting with a DRE machine. And he even managed to snap the error with his phone camera and get a camera crew to film it. Nice. Link
Another reader, Kent Brewster, had a rather disturbing time when he asked to vote on paper (as he is allowed to do). The post says it all but it sounds like people choosing to avoid the electronic systems are being given an intentionally hard time. Link
A whole pile of US e-voting experts have started blogging on the US election.
I think they'll have a busy few days. I don't think there will any better place to watch how the technology of the presidential election performs.
If I was deaf I'd probably be in Portsmouth by now.
Returning from a client meeting I was enjoying the pleasures of Clapham Junction. The electronic signs informed me that the first train would be to Chichester and the second was to my destination, Brighton.
Time passed… a train came and left while I was on the phone. Looking up I saw that the boards hadn't changed… the Chichester and Brighton trains were still up there looking rather late. You know how it goes:
14:28 Chichester expected 14:35
14:32 Brighton expected 14:38
Time 14:41
Then an announcement:
“Customers are advised to ignore the electronic information board as the information displayed is incorred. This is due to a software fault.”
The message is repeated several times over the next five minutes. So what exactly is the next train? Finally we're told it's one to Eastbourne… so I missed my train. Great.
The Eastbourne train pulls up, it's own electronic destination signs proudly showing “00 Victoria” – so where was it going? A voice echoes on the PA reasuring us of the destination. I step on in the hope that it really will stop at Haywards Heath so I can change.
If I hadn't heard any of the announcements then I would have been well and truly stuffed. If you're blind people notice and try to help, but at least you can hear announcements.
If you're deaf it's hard for the hearing to tell so you just look around and use your wits and hope there isn't a software fault.
I've been working with online communities since I first started using and running bulletin board systems in 1993. We've come a long way since the days of dial-up, ASCII-based systems with bundles of modems screeching as callers tried to connect. Nowadays communities are far more accessible, powerful and easy to set up. Where before it was a thrill if there was one other person online with you, today thanks to instant messaging I can chat with hundreds of people at the same time. So, in spite of all the changes, I'm still building online communities for businesses, associations and non-profit groups.
A few conversations led me to realise that online communities is what I do every day. A few 'aha!' discussions later with my fellow directors and Swing Digital was being reformulated to make our new-found (old) focus clear. It's incredible to think that we've been going since 2000. We've built communities for extreme skiers, software users, alumni associations, political groups; and it's been great fun. So what do you want to build?
All that to say… we've got a new website: http://www.swingdigital.com
Now that's useful check out Dimensionizer a free plugin for MacOS X. It provides a contextual menu in the finder with an images dimensions… perfect!
It seems to me that in the final days of the US election TV is still where it's at.
Last night I watched the special Question Time from Miami, Florida. On the panel was an odd collection of voices from a bombastic Michael Moore to The Sun's Richard Littlejohn. But boy was it fun to watch the crowd… it was like a pantomine, Republicans booed when anyone said that Europe or the world might prefer Kerry – talk about denial. It was fun watching though nothing new really came out if it.
There's another TV-centric story that does bring the Internet into view however. George W's 'wrinkled shirt' during the debates. Did he have a device on his back or not? It was the TV cameras who gave us the lead but it's the web pushing the story forward. The latest is Salon's report on an analysis by a NASA imaging specialist who is adamant that there was an electronic device on Bush's back. This is just such an odd story people can't help to want to know more… and it's the online sources that can do so quickly.
Jason Kitcat 