In which I exercise my CIVIC DUTY
Per Wired (yes, again), it's already starting.
I initially got into tech-headery out of necessity. Technology breaks - it breaks all the damned time, and I'll never be affluent enough to make "just go buy a new one" the option of anything but last resort. If you didn't inherit it from your grandfather or build it yourself, somebody somewhere got the job to build at least one component of it because he would do it cheaper than anyone else. From the six simple machines to the iPod of the week, this is as universally-applicable as gravity. Learn it, live it, love it, and expect it in every aspect of your life involving more advanced gadgetry than your average abacus.
Menial bloggers from backwater burgs in Tennessee understanding what the moneyed elite don't is really how I prefer the world to work. E-voting vendor Diebold has a history practically as long as e-voting itself of being really, really, really, ridiculously bad at the building e-voting machines that are, from both a hardware and software perspective, secure and reliable.
But that's okay, because the State Department doesn't care what evidence "blogs" present.
I can't speak for the mindset behind a company whose response to such a grave responsibility is such a slipshod series of products, but I can tell you what a series of low-dollar off-the-shelf PCs and 15-year-old cars has taught me about low-bidder tech: watch your ass.
I don't care who vote for (as long as it isn't for some stupid OMG SEKRIT MUSLIM FEAR reason), but as an American citizen, you have both the responsibility to vote and the right to have your vote duly and accurately counted. If whatever godawful monstrosity the state's sticking us with this time around appears to be in any way malfunctioning, notify someone in charge. If they don't give the problem the attention it deserves, find someone who does. When every vote is placed in a box which may or may not be on fire, the problem becomes a little bit bigger than just your vote. Depending on the SOP of your voting location, the problem you're having could effect any number of virtual ballots sitting in the machine's all-too-unstable memory.
UPDATE: ES&S, whose record for integrity includes blaming poll workers for magically making touchscreens not work, might be trying to beat Diebold to the punch in Tennessee. Mind your party affiliation.
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I had the flu last week. I think I broke my Chinese Knockoff Devastator.
I initially got into tech-headery out of necessity. Technology breaks - it breaks all the damned time, and I'll never be affluent enough to make "just go buy a new one" the option of anything but last resort. If you didn't inherit it from your grandfather or build it yourself, somebody somewhere got the job to build at least one component of it because he would do it cheaper than anyone else. From the six simple machines to the iPod of the week, this is as universally-applicable as gravity. Learn it, live it, love it, and expect it in every aspect of your life involving more advanced gadgetry than your average abacus.
Menial bloggers from backwater burgs in Tennessee understanding what the moneyed elite don't is really how I prefer the world to work. E-voting vendor Diebold has a history practically as long as e-voting itself of being really, really, really, ridiculously bad at the building e-voting machines that are, from both a hardware and software perspective, secure and reliable.
But that's okay, because the State Department doesn't care what evidence "blogs" present.
I can't speak for the mindset behind a company whose response to such a grave responsibility is such a slipshod series of products, but I can tell you what a series of low-dollar off-the-shelf PCs and 15-year-old cars has taught me about low-bidder tech: watch your ass.
I don't care who vote for (as long as it isn't for some stupid OMG SEKRIT MUSLIM FEAR reason), but as an American citizen, you have both the responsibility to vote and the right to have your vote duly and accurately counted. If whatever godawful monstrosity the state's sticking us with this time around appears to be in any way malfunctioning, notify someone in charge. If they don't give the problem the attention it deserves, find someone who does. When every vote is placed in a box which may or may not be on fire, the problem becomes a little bit bigger than just your vote. Depending on the SOP of your voting location, the problem you're having could effect any number of virtual ballots sitting in the machine's all-too-unstable memory.
UPDATE: ES&S, whose record for integrity includes blaming poll workers for magically making touchscreens not work, might be trying to beat Diebold to the punch in Tennessee. Mind your party affiliation.
----
I had the flu last week. I think I broke my Chinese Knockoff Devastator.
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