[E-voting] Question on optical scan

[Timothy Murphy]

On Thursday 20 January 2005 14:35, Aengus Lawlor wrote:

> > My thoughts at the beginning were more or less along the lines you
> > suggest, as I think were most people's -
> > "This is a great occasion. This is democracy at work."
> > But 7 hours later the universal response among those I spoke to was,
> > "There has to be a better way."
>
> Timothy, what was different about that count than every other count in
> the last 70 years?

It lasted much longer than any other count I've been to,
probably because there were 3 separate counts
(2 elections and a referendum).

> "There has to be a better way" is not the reaction of most people
> attending an election count.

Well, I went to a pub afterwards with quite a few of my party colleagues -
and this is the party most likely to think along your lines -
and the view that something had to change was universal.
In fact I was the least in favour of change,
arguing thst counts are a valuable social occasion
for those involved in the back-room of politiics.

I had much the same feeling the other day
when I went to Glenageary Postal Sorting Office
to collect a registered letter which had arrived that morning,
and which they took 25 minutes to find,
looking in boxes and pigeon-holes all over the place:
"There has to be a better way of organising this."


-- 
Timothy Murphy  
e-mail (<80k only): tim /at/ birdsnest.maths.tcd.ie
tel: +353-86-2336090, +353-1-2842366
s-mail: School of Mathematics, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland