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As we have all been hearing, the situation with electronic voting in the U.S. (and elsewhere) is a mess. Free (GPL) software seems to make the most sense for a host of reasons. However, with efforts as widely distributed as they are, what seems clearly like a very good idea isn't making much headway...
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As we have all been hearing, the situation with electronic voting in the U.S.
(and elsewhere) is a mess. Free (GPL) software seems to make the most sense
for a host
of reasons. However, with efforts as widely distributed as they are, what
seems clearly like a very good idea isn't making much headway.
Blue Screen Democracy seeks
to engage the open-source developer base (you) in order to implement what the
most people think are the best methods cited in the available abstract designs
for e-voting systems (including, but not limited to Blind
signature [pdf], n-Version [pdf],
FROGS [pdf]).
In other words, to develop the software not in the way we think best, but in
the way the most people think best: democratically.
There have been efforts, referenced here,
here,
and here
to develop an open-source electronic voting solution, and at least one
project is well under way (in Python). Not wanting to cause an unnecessary
crack in the already patch-work body of free-software voting machine advocacy/development
groups, but unsatisfied with the results of existing development efforts to date,
we find ourselves at somewhat of an impasse.
Thus, this simple appeal, "What should we do?" Is the OVC
system (EVM 2003) good enough? To us, their effort seems stale-mated, to
you: should we be supporting it anyway? Are we satisfied with their implementation?
As an organization, we would be happy to get behind a system supported by the
open source development community. If you do think we need something besides
the OVC system, we have opened up a SourceForge
page to begin discussion. Calling all cryptographers, security experts,
coders, architects, with no need to over-dramatize, the future of open government
is at stake.
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