Perfect.co.uk has an excellent roundup of political blogging in the UK, including the announcement that Boris Johnson has started blogging (thanks to Tim Ireland's encouragement). Fantastic news, Boris is the only man who could have spearheaded the Tory blogging charge.
Following on from the Electoral Commission's report on the all-postal ballot pilots this year there is news that e-voting may be put on the slow burn, thanks in part to the Commission's view that all-postal ballots should no longer be held.
There was some pretty tame debate on the Commission's report in Parliament recently. Thankfully there was also a rather decent debate held yesterday (Thursday 16th) in Westminster Hall discussing the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister: Housing, Planning, Local Government and the Regions Committee report on postal voting.
KableNet have put some rather selective quotes from this Westminster Hall debate together with a quote from the Electoral Commission to suggest that there will be no e-voting trials before May 2006 at the earliest. We shall see if this holds true but the new foundation model for multi-channel voting which the Commission wants to prepare will take time to develop and so such delays sound realistic enough to my ears.
In their Government Computing Weekly email the folks over at KableNet write:
This may be a problem for e-voting enthusiasts and for IT companies wanting to get a market going, but it is also bad news for the democratic process.
It's not that e-voting can improve turnout levels – the evidence on this is inconclusive – but what it does mean is that our election system only falls further behind the times.
If e-voting is ever going to work, and to provide what could be an extremely useful service for people, it needs much more testing. It was just this that the local pilots provided. Gaining public trust and confidence in e-voting will only have suffered a serious setback if the pilots don't go ahead.
Two problems with this view…
It assumes that e-voting one way or another is inevitable. We have seen from the all-postal pilots that just because something new is tried doesn't mean it will inevitably adopted.
The comment also seems to suggest that e-voting isn't happening anywhere else in the world. It is… the US presidential elections in a few months will be just one of many opportunities to learn about how hard it is to get e-voting right.
I'm very proud to announce that the excellent journal Information, Communication & Ethics in Society have published my article 'Government and ICT Standards: An Electronic Voting Case Study'.
It's in Vol 2, Issue 3 which I only just got hold of (having been so busy I haven't been into SPRU for a while). Please do support this journal by subscribing!
A rather breathless article popped into my newsreader today. The headline?
Richmond council is World first for internet voting
Hmmm. Right… give them a chance. Reading on…
Richmond upon Thames LBC are allowing residents the chance to vote online to help set the council agenda on key scrutiny issues. This will be the first time that internet voting has been used by a local authority in not only the UK, but in the World!
Oh dear, oh dear. Of course not only have other local councils used Internet voting in the past, but so have many other parts of this world of ours. Well still wanting to give some benefit of the doubt I click over to the voting page on Richmond's site. It's not even Internet voting, it's an online poll which anyone can participate in, not just residents. sigh
I'm all in favour of small, tactical e-democracy projects. It's a key theme of mine in presentations, but I also always argue for building low expectations. World firsts which are totally misleading do not help. Let's involve people in all levels of politics and democratic processes, but let's take the time to get the little things right too.
In an article that mashes together two vital issues Wired News tells us about Nova Scotia's recycling program.
The article fascinates in two ways. Firstly, it reports on a study which shows that Nova Scotia's highly proactive recycling strategy saves the province between CAN$25-125 million each year. Good news in its own right, a traditional analysis would just have seen the cost in starting up a programme which recycles nearly 50% of all the province's waste.
The second theme in the article explores the growing use of alternative indicators to measure progress. GDP just doesn't have the nuance or breadth to properly reflect issues such as sustainability, voluntary work and the time wasted in commuting. The Genuine Progress Index (GPI) as used in the Nova Scotia report tries to integrate these softer factors into a numeric index. This kind of work is vital for pushing sustainability and quality of life up the agenda. As study co-author Sally Walker says “If there's no number associated with something, it's assumed to be zero.”
I caught Bulworth on TV last night. I've been meaning to see it for a while. Nothing prepared me for how good it was!
After letting the anger and honesty of the film wash over me I went online to find out more. Sure Wag the Dog and Primary Colours came out in the same 12 months and were both strong. But they were still very Hollywood, I enjoyed them yes, but Bulworth was like a stick of dynamite under my seat. The others were less energising for me. I'm just stunned how much Bulworth was panned at the time (e.g. Charles Taylor in Salon).
Decide for yourself, rent it now. It's perfect viewing as the US presidential election builds up to its finale.
Via Wired News, fantastic come-back from Edwards:
Is Dick Cheney trying to prove he's hip to the internet? Speaking Thursday in Cincinnati, Cheney downplayed recent negative economic indicators, such as unemployment rates and consumer spending, because they miss an important source of income for Americans: eBay. “That's a source that didn't even exist 10 years ago,” Cheney said. “Four hundred thousand people make some money trading on eBay.” Let's hope these folks aren't selling off their belongings to stay afloat. John Edwards, the Democratic VP challenger, responded: “If we only included bake sales and how much money kids make at lemonade stands, this economy would really be cooking.”
BoingBoing points to an incredible Quicktime VR panorama of 2002's 'Tribute in Light' to the victims of 9/11. Rotate upwards from people blurring by to see the shafts of light disappearing into the clouds.
The site [panoramas.dk][pdk] is truly packed with similar Virtual Reality wonders… I've just had a great time there viewing all sorts of incredible interactive imagery. It's like living in the future.
More on the Newham story continues to trickle out. As I said in an earlier blog entry, it was no great surprise that the council stuck with Microsoft. But the fact that apparently independent reports could justify huge cost savings in using Microsoft over Open Source was questionable. John Lettice at The Register comes to the rescue with an excellent article exposing the flawed methodologies and spin used to get the conclusions Microsoft wanted.
It's getting easier and easier to 'find' important documents when a story calls for it. Companies need to learn that simplistic fudging of findings is very difficult to get away with in this digital age.
Thanks to Tom Raggett for the links
Tom Steinberg of MySociety has some good thoughts on the limitations of using the Net for political campaigning. One more thing though, don't underestimate the importance of websites for getting press coverage. Journalists love using sites to root around press releases, get photos and bios all pre-prepared for them. A good media section can significantly boost a candidate's chances of getting a mention.
Jason Kitcat 