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Voting? Paper or Plastic?

So after all the brouhaha about how the elections officials in Santa Clara County were directing their people not to offer paper ballots when there were those oh so reliable electronic voting machines, guess what I was asked when I got to the registration table in Mountain View City Hall? Electronic or Paper?

I picked paper. Then the ladies filling in the paper ledger circled “P” for paper, I signed on the line with a pen and off I went to sit down at a table to make my decision. The way people have been doing it in our country for over 200 years.

And probably a good things seeing as BoingBoing is reporting that another Santa Clara County resident got the voting machine equivalent of the blue screen o’death. Luckily for all of us he was armed with a camera phone to protect his right to vote. Other Santa Clara County voters’ experiencesweren’t as easy as mine. My co-worker voted at the firehall in Mountain View and was asked why she wanted one and given a quilt trip for having asked for a paper ballot. And from what’s written on BoingBoing other people in Santa Clara County are having similar experiences. Um, aren’t we by law entitled to a paper ballot? And isn’t it against the law for polling stations to hinder that request? Hmmm…

As for hindering voting, my friend told me that she did the electronic version and there was no way for her to write in a candidate. Nader is a write in candidate here in California, for those not aware. The guy who’s running for president from jail is on the ballot, but we can’t easily write in a guy that’s trying to get the US to go for a legitimate three party system. That will have to wait until next time I suppose.

During the half hour that I was in line and could actually see the voting area ( I was in line for an hour from 7 to 8 am) there were only a handful of people that chose the paper method. I was talking to a guy in line and was mulling over with him whether or not I was going to go the paper route. He said, “If it was any place other than California, then I’d do paper.” Without getting to intrusive, I could only infer he meant that if he was in a swing state, and he felt that his vote really could make a difference, he would certainly vote paper. I consider it a bit of a social faux pax to ask someone in line who they’re voting for. Following that thought with him would have led me down that route.

But despite the electronic voting system, lines continued to be long. Maybe it’s because Californians have 31 decisionsto make while standing there. Sitting down, I breezed through the paper ballot while other people were left standing to figure out the touch screens.

For those wondering why I chose paper. Electronic voting in the way that it’s implemented right now, does not sit well with me. What happens if someone decides they’re going to let off an EMP and knock out all the machines causing them lose all their data? Or more likely, what happens if votes need to be recounted? Where’s the paper trail? Also, how do I know that the people I voted for are what was recorded in the system? I don’t right now. But I do know if I mark the paper myself. It’s more manual intensive, but I know that I haven’t been disenfranchised by a malfunctioning computer.

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News Readers: Bad UI or Bad Docs?

On Wednesday evening I went to a little pre-Supernova 2004dinner. Joichi Ito suggested the dinner, however he was not in attendance as he was in Japan or somewhere. But 110 people showed up anyway. Talk about the power of suggestion. (Or the power of a blog.)

Since Supernova had a session entitled “Syndication Nation: Is This What Comes After the Web?”, I was able to get some solutions to the issues in my previous post. And better yet, the solutions came from the mouths of the guys creating the software for this stuff. (I say guys as there were a total of 5 women in the room that evening, including myself.)

Ultimately what I learned on Wednesday night was that a lot of my frustration came from not knowing how to properly use the tools that I already have on my computer. I’d like to think that it’s not because I’m a stupid user, but more because I’m an ill-informed user. Since many of these newsreaders developed as side projects, there’s a lack of technical documentation. And I’m sure they’ll all acknowledge that and say “But we don’t have money for it.” My suggestion, find it. Or find friends that are willing to help you out. The reason I say that is because you won’t be able to rise to the top without it. Just check out the reviews of some the newsreaders that are out there. I can tell you that the negative comments for SharpReader result from the fact that the user doesn’t fully understand how to use it. Actually before you write the user guide, do some user testing. You’ll see what greatly needs to be improved immediately.

Newsgroup issue solved!
While eating some yummy Indian appetizers, Mark Fletcher of Bloglines sat down at my table. Little did he know he chose to sit near a “stupid user”, well, more like ill-informed user. I told Mark that I wanted feeds of my Phish newsgroup. He nicely informed me that Google Groupsjust introduced xml feeds for all of their newsgroups. So I came home, and low and behold, after googling the Google site for it I found it. Buried in Google Labs. So I can now subscribe via the Google Groups 2 beta. Thanks Mark for pointing me in the right direction! Although I could have avoided looking like a newbie to the newsgroup rss if a) I wasted time to dig a little deeper to find it and b) Google had a link to their Google Groups 2 Beta off the Google Groups page. Bad UI? Or do they just not want me finding it?

Next on my list – Calendars.
Although I was privy to a heated discussion on foaf a few weeks back, I didn’t realize that the conversation over dim sum was a potential answer to the calendaring and friends question. Jonathan Moore told me that Mosuki is the answer. It combines social networking and an events calendar. I’ve tried it. It’s cool, but it need user documentation. So I’ve agreed to write it. I’ll let you know what it can do later once I’ve learned more about it.

Newsreader TiVo
Supposedly, NewsMonster can tell me what other sites I might like based on what I’m already subscribed to. Well, that’s what Kevin Burtonsaid, and I have yet to find out. NewsMonster doesn’t seem to work with my Windows operating system at the moment, but Kevin said that within the next month he’d send me a copy that will. I’m holding him to it! Oh and for those who read the Wired article on Kevin, he’s not creepy like it makes him out to be.

There’s an Orkut in my newsreader?
Well this one seems to be a bit far off. First, all the friendsters, orkuts, and other social networking systems would have to be able to talk to each other. Marc Canter is a great one to debate with on this topic. He’s working on getting them all to at least play nice with each other. Just don’t start with security issues. Once that’s sorted out perhaps they’ll then implement something with RSS.

Websites without RSS?
Seems that there are sites/people out there that are developing feeds for sites that are not embracing RSS. However, sometimes they get into trouble from the website owners. I don’t see why you wouldn’t create RSS files for your site. Loss of revenue, maybe. But if you only serve out a portion of the article or a brief synopsis of what’s been updated, then people will have to go to the site anyway. I thought of a great use for RSS in direct marketing, including building a list database and how it discourages list selling. But I’ll tell you about it later.

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First Entry Ever

Well I’ve finally gotten my act in gear and have updated my website after having stagnant content on it for more than a year. I’ll try to update this in a daily basis with stories about my life and critiques on anything from advertising to why I can’t find a decent bagel in Vancouver.
For my first story — I finally bought a cell phone. Part of the reason why I didn’t have one was that I didn’t want to be one of those people who answer them in restaurants, talk really loud because the person on the other end can’t hear you over the noise (or so you think), or one of those nasty drivers who talk incessantly on the phone while they’re merging onto the Lions Gate Bridge.

But the reason why I finally broke down and bought one is because I have this fear that something will happen (mainly bad) and my family can’t get in touch with me. It happened last year. I was in the middle of nowhere heli-hiking and well, the world turned upside down and my sister was in the middle of it. It all turned out okay in the end (I’ll save that story for later), but one of the side effects for me was that I’m always suspecting that something will happen.

I resisted buying a phone the entire year, but the urge didn’t go away.
So now, I have a phone. I vow not to turn into one of those rude cell phone people, but I fear it may be inevitable. The same sort of inevitablity of being a very rude driver when you own a Mercedes. (Another story about someone in my building for another day.)
More stories to come…