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“A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

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Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#111

Post by twtw »

athenot wrote: post #12
CWuestefeld wrote: post #3

If we think that not enough people are voting, the way to solve this is NOT through get-out-the-vote efforts, voter registration drives, and tools like this to make it easier to cast a vote. These are not the bottleneck. Voting may be a duty, but it's one that carries a lot of responsibility. Getting ignorant people to cast poorly-informed votes does not help our society. And I think that people realize this. So when…

Moving voting day from a Tuesday to a Sunday would also make a big difference. There are many people who have have informed opinions but can't afford to take off work (write-up for being late to work/take off early, lost income, transport issues). Also that would avoid removing a school day since most public schools are used for polling. Another option would be to switch to make mail-in ballots only.

I'm not sure - CA has permanent vote by mail available to all eligible voters, and saw about a 38% voter turnout yesterday. Texas does not, and saw about a 40% voter turnout. If getting to the polling place is the bottleneck, I would expect CAs vote by mail option would increase voter turnout relative to somewhere without it.

(Cue someone saying I can't compare TX to CA - it seems like if I can't that demonstrates that there are other factors that matter just as much or more)

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#112

Post by CrlNvl »

throwawaylolx wrote: post #84
mosselman wrote: post #71

Voting is a solved problem: fill in some box on paper. What is automating it ever going to solve?

Increasing participation? I won't drive out of my way and queue somewhere to vote. Sure, many people think the solution to this is shaming me for not caring enough about democracy, but it is obviously not working. If it were easy and safe to vote from my phone, I may be more inclined to vote.

So this is clearly a funding problem and a date problem. I don't know what the situation is in the US, but in France it never took me (or my parents) more than 15 minutes to cast a vote. Most of the time I'm in and out within 10 minutes. Vote always happen on Sunday.

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#113

Post by wu-ikkyu »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #79
CWuestefeld wrote: post #3

If we think that not enough people are voting, the way to solve this is NOT through get-out-the-vote efforts, voter registration drives, and tools like this to make it easier to cast a vote. These are not the bottleneck. Voting may be a duty, but it's one that carries a lot of responsibility. Getting ignorant people to cast poorly-informed votes does not help our society. And I think that people realize this. So when…

There are at least three groups of people who don't vote. One group is the lazy. The second group is those for whom things are going reasonably well - the lights work, the roads get repaired, crime isn't too bad, their economic circumstances aren't terrible, and so why worry? No matter who gets elected, the lights are going to continue to work, and so on - it won't be a radical change either way. (This group may over…

>The third group is those in despair. They see the problems in society, and they see fifty years' worth of politicians who have promised to fix them, and the problems are still here. They've given up on politics as an answer to the problems of society.

As someone who falls under this group, I've often suggested that we should allow more participation for the individual in the democratic process, seeing as how the fundamental assumptions and constraints of society have so drastically changed since the current system was designed:

"In a large society, inhabiting an extensive country, it is impossible that the whole should assemble to make laws. The first necessary step, then, is to depute power from the many to a few of the most wise and good."

-John Adams, Thoughts on Government 1776

Ironically, many of the same people who disparage others for not "participating" enough in democracy (by voting), see a more direct/participatory system to be out of the question, claiming people are too stupid to have more involvement.

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#114

Post by simias »

logifail wrote: post #50
bilbo0s wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and “blockchain,” which it claims allows it to secure the voting process... (I'm rubbing my temples right now) I don't even have the words for how bad this would be for a democracy or republic. I will, however, make a curt but general comment on blockchain: Anytime you see that buzzword, be on your guard.

Question: Are there (m)any people other than those involved in the manufacture and sales of voting machines , or their lobbyists, that support increased automation in the voting process? I'm absolutely, 100% happy with putting a pencil mark onto a paper ballot, which I fold and place into a box (with people watching), which is later taken (with people watching) to a counting place, emptied out on a table (with people…

I'm with you on that but I was surprised to find out during the last Brazilian election that they seem to do most of their voting on electronic machines and it seems well accepted over there. At least when I mentioned that to Brazilian colleagues they seemed fine with it.

This video (in Portuguese) shows a "tear down" endorsed by the manufacturer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wrMLzqgKEI

Both the tone of the video (unsurprisingly, given its "officially endorsed" nature) but also the comments seem overall pretty positive. Even though they mention that the software is closed source and you basically have to trust the manufacturer (and any third parties making hardware and software for the device along the way).

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#115

Post by gambler »

I know how to solve this problem. Upload a speech by each candidate to YouTube on election day. At the end of the day whomever gets the least downvotes wins.

Google's CAPTCHA and profiling will protect us from election tampering and make sure only the people who are allowed to vote will vote.

Might need CAPTCHA 4, though. The one where you go through a DNA test to verify your uniqueness, then get an RFID implant for truly secure 2-factor authentication. I'm not sure where blockchain and IoT will come in play, by I'm sure we will will find a place to plug them in.

(If by this point you didn't catch on that this was sarcasm, I'm not sure there is anything I can do.)

There is a much simpler solution for increasing participation. Don't punish busy people. Hold voting on a weekend, over the entire 2 days. You will get a massive surge in participation. Yes, it will be more expensive, but that can be optimized. Heck, just add a checkbox on tax forms that says "if you support weekend elections, check here and we will charge you extra X dollars". You will get tons of money for this initiative.

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#116

Post by umvi »

athenot wrote: post #12
CWuestefeld wrote: post #3

If we think that not enough people are voting, the way to solve this is NOT through get-out-the-vote efforts, voter registration drives, and tools like this to make it easier to cast a vote. These are not the bottleneck. Voting may be a duty, but it's one that carries a lot of responsibility. Getting ignorant people to cast poorly-informed votes does not help our society. And I think that people realize this. So when…

Moving voting day from a Tuesday to a Sunday would also make a big difference. There are many people who have have informed opinions but can't afford to take off work (write-up for being late to work/take off early, lost income, transport issues). Also that would avoid removing a school day since most public schools are used for polling. Another option would be to switch to make mail-in ballots only.

I don't think so. In Maryland anyone can vote early at their convenience. That rules out work since you can just fill out the ballot at your leisure.

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#117

Post by twtw »

CWuestefeld wrote: post #89
king07828 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alternatively, make each elected office require a man and a woman to be independently elected to that office. Have the decision making power split equally between the two 50-50 so that both must agree before taking action (e.g., signing or vetoing bills, or casting votes for bills). Each political party would provide both a male candidate and a female candidate for each office.

Why a man and a woman? How about a tall person and a short person, or a religious person and an atheist, or a white person and a black person (but what about other races?), and so forth? What is sacred about men versus women, especially since we're told that there's no actual difference between men and women?

> especially since we're told that there's no actual difference between men and women?

Who is telling you this? This runs contrary to decades of research findings (however distasteful some might find that).

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#118

Post by dragonwriter »

bun_at_work wrote: post #97
knieveltech wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want people to vote make it mandatory like Australia. Anything short of that seems incoherent.

Mandatory voting? How would you propose enforcing it? How does Australia enforce it? I'm not necessarily against mandatory voting, but it would be very hard to convince the American public that mandatory voting is a good idea when a huge part of the population would see that as an attack on their freedom to not vote. This doesn't even begin to discuss the situations where voting only occurs on a Tuesday (aside from m…

> Mandatory voting? How would you propose enforcing it?

With a financial penalty if you don't submit a ballot. The simplest method would probably be a per-election tax credit.

> I'm not necessarily against mandatory voting, but it would be very hard to convince the American public that mandatory voting is a good idea when a huge part of the population would see that as an attack on their freedom to not vote.

Most mandatory voting regimes require submitting a ballot, but they tend to accept explicit abstention (usually, just by submitting a blank ballot.)

> This doesn't even begin to discuss the situations where voting only occurs on a Tuesday (aside from mail-ins) and some people can't take that time off work. There would have to be some clause to force employers to let employees go vote, at a loss of money somewhere.

Almost every state already does that, and the exceptions (IIRC) have long early voting periods and/or all mail-in elections which avoid the Tuesday-only problem. So that's not really a problem.

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#119

Post by dragonwriter »

knieveltech wrote: post #67
CWuestefeld wrote: post #3

If we think that not enough people are voting, the way to solve this is NOT through get-out-the-vote efforts, voter registration drives, and tools like this to make it easier to cast a vote. These are not the bottleneck. Voting may be a duty, but it's one that carries a lot of responsibility. Getting ignorant people to cast poorly-informed votes does not help our society. And I think that people realize this. So when…

If you want people to vote make it mandatory like Australia. Anything short of that seems incoherent.

> If you want people to vote make it mandatory like Australia.

Empirically, a more proportional election system not only improves satisfaction with government, but also participation in voting.

People not voting should be a signal that there is something wrong with the voting system’s fitness for purpose. Mandatory voting may treat the symptom, but ignores the underlying problem.

Re: “A Horrifically Bad Idea”: Smartphone Voting Is Coming

#120

Post by twtw »

wu-ikkyu wrote: post #113
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are at least three groups of people who don't vote. One group is the lazy. The second group is those for whom things are going reasonably well - the lights work, the roads get repaired, crime isn't too bad, their economic circumstances aren't terrible, and so why worry? No matter who gets elected, the lights are going to continue to work, and so on - it won't be a radical change either way. (This group may over…

>The third group is those in despair. They see the problems in society, and they see fifty years' worth of politicians who have promised to fix them, and the problems are still here. They've given up on politics as an answer to the problems of society. As someone who falls under this group, I've often suggested that we should allow more participation for the individual in the democratic process, seeing as how the fun…

I don't see how "the whole [assembling] to make laws" is any more possible now than in the 1700s. Are you thinking drafting laws by wiki, or what?
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