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The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

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Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#61

Post by jandrese »

neonate wrote: post #35
marcell wrote: post #30

My coworker has an alternate theory that frankly makes a lot more sense than “the app broke.” The Iowa caucus is not a paper ballot. People stand in groups in a large multipurpose room and raise their hands for who they vote for. Depending on the viability threshold, people move to new groups and are recounted. The exact rules are complicated and the process is run by unpaid humans. Moreover, in 2020 everyone has sma…

I don't think that's a better theory. The process may be 'bad' but it has been that way, and worked, for a long time. As far as we know, the new ingredient was the app.

There were some confounding factors, like an apparent day-of decision to require the caucuses to report the results of every vote cast, not just the last one. This led to considerably higher data requirements in precincts where multiple votes were necessary to reach consensus. The new requirements were apparently not reported to the staff until around noon on the day of the election.

As anybody can tell you, nothing sinks projects faster than changing requirements late in the development cycle.

The app also sucked for another reason. Lots of Iowa is rural and cell coverage can be spotty. The app was designed with the all too common assumption in this day and age that the Internet works everywhere.

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#62

Post by sl1ck731 »

allovernow wrote: post #40

The owners and staffers at Shadow INC have a severe conflict of interest. The company is loaded with former Clinton staffers and the CEO sent a tweet in support of Buttigeig, who recently paid tens of thousands to the company. Other suspicious dealings are a premature victory announcement by Buttigeig's campaign and a leak of a picture of paper tallies which included a PIN allegedly used to login to the tally app. Lo…

Should a company's employees/CEO have to be apolitical? I'd be surprised if there is such a company where none of its employees are involved in politics in any way. Especially if its a company whose sole purpose is developing software for a political party.

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#64

Post by bluGill »

pmoriarty wrote: post #4

How long will it take our society to realize that democracy is threatened when machines are involved in voting or vote counting? Going back to voting exclusively by ink on paper and hand counting is imperative.

This is a caucus not an election. The democrats have never used paper ballots (as far as I know - my history is short though). The republicans still use hand counted ballots.

Either way in a caucus you are NOT electing a president, you are just choosing a delegate who goes on to the national convention where the president is chosen. There are rules so that the caucus results feed who is supported at the national convention, but there are ways around those rules if you want to go to the national convention and then support someone who wasn't even running in the first place - though you pretty well better be assured of a win before you think about trying those tricks as the media will go nuts. (the same rules exist in primary states, technically there is a caucus somewhere that chooses the delegate to the national convention who can then vote for someone else)

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#65

Post by briandear »

jariel wrote: post #41
pmoriarty wrote: post #4

How long will it take our society to realize that democracy is threatened when machines are involved in voting or vote counting? Going back to voting exclusively by ink on paper and hand counting is imperative.

Paper ballots with scanned results in the booth. No scan means redo your vote. That way you have a track record + instant results. Folks can take home the stub to ensure non-repudiation etc.. They can look up the serial number on the stub they take home to see for sure it was recorded. FYI we should also have basic ID requirements for voting. The arguments against it are kind of ridiculous, and federal or state ID sh…

[flagged]

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#66

Post by nooron »

whylie wrote: post #58
nooron wrote: post #44

I started a company that was asked to write a proposal to make what became the app that failed last night. I declined because it was outside of our core skillset. You can read my prior comments or look at my profile to validate this. If you want my perspective as someone who started a Democratic software company, you should keep reading. This app emerged from a mandate to make the caucus more accessible and transpare…

>Shadow is a firm that makes custom software for Democrats and progressives. If I can ask, why the specific nature for their clientele? Isolating your solutions to a specific political party seems strange to me especially if the emphasis on making money. If anything, money normally supersedes political leanings at the end of the day which makes the whole fiasco even stranger to me. Wouldn't you want to provide a solu…

Hey, I'm really glad you asked, and I'm happy to share. The reason that most people start companies in politics is because they have strong political leanings. You do it because you believe strongly in something or someone and want to support it, even if it pays less or sucks.

Even if you wanted to cross the aisle, it would be hard. If you work for Democrats, Republicans will not work with you. If you work for Republicans, Democrats will not work with you.

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#67

Post by tptacek »

war1025 wrote: post #59
nooron wrote: post #44

I started a company that was asked to write a proposal to make what became the app that failed last night. I declined because it was outside of our core skillset. You can read my prior comments or look at my profile to validate this. If you want my perspective as someone who started a Democratic software company, you should keep reading. This app emerged from a mandate to make the caucus more accessible and transpare…

I don't know whether I heard correctly or if the number was accurate, but I heard someone throw out $60k as the amount paid for the app development this morning on the radio. That sounds like a lot of money to a lay-person, but assuming $100/hr, which seems like at least a reasonable ballpark rate, that breaks down to 600 man-hours, or 15 man-weeks. That is a very tight deadline to turn out a critical app like this.…

60k for an app that runs results collections for the Iowa Democratic Caucus sounds absurdly low. By comparison, just to get an app like that assessed for security issues --- and my assumption is that this is not an especially complicated app --- you'd already in the neighborhood of 20k.

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#68

Post by bluGill »

generalpass wrote: post #43

Should Google or Apple take the app off the app store? Seems like a scam...

An app like this should not be on any app store ever. You want only pre-chosen people to have access to the app. It does no good for anyone else to have access to this and it can hurt.

4 years ago I had the Republican app on my phone. I was the backup reporter just in case the main reporter had problems. Since the main reporter used the app correctly I didn't use it, but I had access to it.

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#69

Post by nooron »

war1025 wrote: post #59
nooron wrote: post #44

I started a company that was asked to write a proposal to make what became the app that failed last night. I declined because it was outside of our core skillset. You can read my prior comments or look at my profile to validate this. If you want my perspective as someone who started a Democratic software company, you should keep reading. This app emerged from a mandate to make the caucus more accessible and transpare…

I don't know whether I heard correctly or if the number was accurate, but I heard someone throw out $60k as the amount paid for the app development this morning on the radio. That sounds like a lot of money to a lay-person, but assuming $100/hr, which seems like at least a reasonable ballpark rate, that breaks down to 600 man-hours, or 15 man-weeks. That is a very tight deadline to turn out a critical app like this.…

I think you are 100% right, it is a very tight deadline with very few manhours. I did not advance far enough in the proposal process to learn their budget but that sounds plausible to me.

Re: The Shadow Inc. app that failed in Iowa last night

#70

Post by jedberg »

sl1ck731 wrote: post #62
allovernow wrote: post #40

The owners and staffers at Shadow INC have a severe conflict of interest. The company is loaded with former Clinton staffers and the CEO sent a tweet in support of Buttigeig, who recently paid tens of thousands to the company. Other suspicious dealings are a premature victory announcement by Buttigeig's campaign and a leak of a picture of paper tallies which included a PIN allegedly used to login to the tally app. Lo…

Should a company's employees/CEO have to be apolitical? I'd be surprised if there is such a company where none of its employees are involved in politics in any way. Especially if its a company whose sole purpose is developing software for a political party.

They don't have to be, but much like with insider trading rules, it's better to avoid even the appearance of a possible conflict.
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