I will contribute $5,000 personally, and you are welcome to use that endorsement to help raise additional funding.Shuttleworth funded the development of Ubuntu (the Linux operating system we use).
See his Wikipedia entry for more information.
Thanks, Mark!
Sure, it says we will be independent from British rule and it explains the philosophy and reasoning behind the action. Overall, it says that we-the-people run things. We can decide for ourselves. We have the right to alter the system of laws, or throw it out altogether and establish a new one -- whatever makes sense to us. The basic concept is self-governance.
Some will say it was only an idea and that, in reality, it was and remains a system created by the elite for the elite. It was a great idea, but the implementation has been poor.
Today, we the people are mere consumers of whatever they are serving. We are mesmerized by gadgetry, trained to believe we can't change things. They will do what they want.
Like everything else, the voting system is controlled by large corporations. Governments are the customers of the voting system vendors. They don't consider you to be the customer because it's been forgotten -- or they never embraced the idea -- that you are the government. This mentality is pervasive and potentially catastrophic for us and the children.
The Declaration of Independence was a great idea. We may never achieve the perfection described, but we can come much closer to it.
The voting system is only one arena where we the people need to assert oversight and control. The open voting movement has made great progress. Still, it's a struggle. People that care enough about these issues to lend support are besieged to contribute by many worthy campaigns. Horrible public policies implemented by elected officials -- elected with horrible voting technology -- have devastated our economy. Gasoline prices have nearly doubled since Election Day 2006. Our supporters are hurting, we are hurting.
OVC is now at a do-or-die moment. We have a great opportunity to show the way to a public voting system at the Linux World conference, which starts one month from today in San Francisco (AUG 4-7). We need to pull together the resources to do this. We will have to expand our base of support rapidly in the coming few weeks.
I think we can do it, but there is no guarantee. The odds are probably against us.
Bottom line: to be successful, in parallel, we have to,
We need to raise $30,000 by August 4th. John-Paul Gignac, a programmer that wrote voter interface code for our 2004 demo, started something called FOSS Factory (FOSS stands for Free Open Source Software). He continues to work for us and has now pledged $5,000 as matching funds for our fundraising drive. I am still looking for a couple of people to make similar leadership pledges. Until then, FOSS Factory will match the first $5,000 in contributions dollar-for-dollar. The Okori Group, led by Brian Fox, is also dedicating resources to the effort, including programming that will move OVC technology a large step toward commercial viability.
OVC is still embryonic. We are designed to be membership based -- members comprised of USERS of open voting technology and PROVIDERS of open voting technology. Prospective members on the provider side include FOSS Factory, The Okori Group, and Open Voting Foundation -- all of which have already dedicated resources to the effort. There are other potential providers that have expressed interest in joining.
We are talking with many potential users (besides individual voters) of open voting technology about joining OVC. We are excited by the prospects. Some potential users we are in conversation with include some of the largest jurisdictions in the US. There are also some small ones that have expressed interest, and are very interesting to us as well. Specifically, some jurisdictions -- cities conducting city elections -- don't need to have us go through the certification process. So, these could be some of the first organizations to join OVC on the user side.
OVC has fallen short in its fundraising drives one time too many. We are in a hole and need to get out. At the same time, our expenses will be much higher than ever as we plan to provide 17 voting booths (fully equipped with OVC Electronic Ballot Printers) and other materials for our exhibit at Linux World. $30,000 is a tall order -- far more than we have ever even attempted to raise in one month.
We know what we need to do and we are doing it. Join us, if you haven't done so already. Help spread the word to people you think might join the effort.
PLEASE DONATE NOW
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Use your credit card (or PayPal acct) or send us a check!
There are several ways to donate money to our cause. The PayPal button on our web site http://openvoting.org is probably the quickest and easiest. This is the address for PayPal: donation@openvotingconsortium.org
You may also use our Amazon account to contribute (best for small, up to $50, anonymous contributions) http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/pay/T43MQSRHDPEDQ/102-0964310-0180917
If by check, please send to:
Open Voting Consortium
9560 Windrose Lane
Granite Bay, CA 95746
Contributions to OVC are not tax deductible, unless you can justify it as a business expense. For example, FOSS Factory's contribution can probably be written off as a business expense (talk to accountant if in doubt) -- membership dues.
Contributions to OPEN VOTING FOUNDATION may be tax deductible: Make your check to our sponsor, "Software in the Public Interest" (or "SPI") and send to my address. You can also make a tax deductible donation online at www.openvotingfoundation.org . (contributions via SPI cost us 5%). We can also accept a check or wire transfer directly to Open Voting Foundation.
We need to raise $30,000 by AUG 4th -- we need most of this money sooner than later. If you are making a larger contribution ($1,000 or more), please consider making a wire transfer. Both Open Voting Consortium and Open Voting Foundation bank with US Bank, routing number 121122676. The account number for OVC is 1534 5394 7266. The OVF account number is 1534 5655 6874. The absolute lowest overhead and fastest way to contribute for us would be to go to a US Bank branch and make a cash deposit to OVC (or OVF).
Thank you again for helping OVC to continue progressing toward the establishment of OPEN VOTING. Don't hesitate to write or call if there is anything you want to talk about. I'm on the phone a lot these days, so leave a message if I don't answer.
Alan Dechert
President, Open Voting Consortium
http://openvoting.org
alan@openvoting.org
9560 Windrose Lane
Granite Bay, CA 95746
916-772-5360
The People's Choice Award for Best Product at LinuxWorld 2008 will be among the contests on the ballot. Conference organizers with World Expo say they "will send out a press release[1] about the area pre-show, and release and promote the result of the ballot, during and after the event."
This plebiscite will include several other issues of interest to conference attendees, including preferences in the race for US President.
With 7,500 voters expected to cast ballots on the system, it will be the largest demonstration so far of the OVC voting system.
_________
[1] Updated 6/15 with press release. A version of the press release formatted to 2 pages is also available.
If you have already tried our previous demo, you might want to download this one to see how we are progressing. If you haven't tried our demo disk yet, please download it and try it out. Let me know if you need help, or read some of the notes about it we have on our website [1].
Here's the url for the download: http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/ad/ovcdemo5.iso [2]
There are several improvements, and the main one is the result of a feature request from Elaine Larson of Santa Clara County. We are listening to feedback from election officials, and we are willing and able to incorporate good ideas they have.
Thanks again for your continued support.
Alan Dechert
http://openvoting.org
___________________________
[1] http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/blog/2008-feb-26/ovc_demo_gaining_exposure
[2] Updated 15 MAY, 2008
We heard some pretty strong statements in support of open voting when she was running for office, but not so much since she was elected [1].
I think this is her strongest public statement so far in support of the idea we have been promoting for so many years. Go to 40:00 minutes into the program to hear what she says about that.
Will LA go for open voting? I don't have a prediction at this point, but I can tell you that I handed Secretary Bowen our demo disk on March 7th in LA and I also handed one to acting registrar, Dean Logan. On the 21st of March, I gave a demo and presentation to Dean Logan and staff at their Norwalk offices. I spoke with Dean Logan yesterday, and we agreed to continue talking about it.
Overall, I think we are making some progress with the consensus building.
Thank you for your support.
Alan Dechert
_______________________________
[1] She wrote a somewhat indirect letter in support of our AB 852 in April of last year, although her office had opposed a couple of key provisions that were in the bill as introduced. Also, in August at the press conference where she announced her decisions coming out of the top-to-bottom review, she said she hoped vendors would start offering open source systems.
Here's the resolution, which has been on the NYS Board web site for some months now:
I initially suggested this to Commissioner Douglas Kellner back in June of last year. It took lots of steps and some persistence, but we got it done. Thanks to Doug Kellner! Professor Richard Johnson of Open Voting Solutions deserves a lot of credit, too: he wrote a letter to the board to get things rolling [1].
Thanks to all for your support to make open voting a reality.
Alan Dechert
[1] here are some posts I made to our discussion list that give an idea of
how this happened:
http://gnosis.python-hosting.com/voting-project/July.2007/0002.html
http://gnosis.python-hosting.com/voting-project/August.2007/0039.html
http://gnosis.python-hosting.com/voting-project/September.2007/0005.html
http://gnosis.python-hosting.com/voting-project/November.2007/0217.html
Please read my previous article about it. We have added a few features including the tabulation program. As before, you can download the disk or request a copy. Also, we will be handing out copies in person to interested parties.
Here are a few notes on this release:
OVC describes the release as a "voting machine on a disk." The demo disk is bootable and contains all the software needed for a complete voting machine. The software does not use any files on the user's hard drive -- the hard drive may be disconnected if desired. The main requirement for the demo computer is that it have 384 megabytes of ram; most any computer made in the last five years will suffice. An attached printer is also required. All the software is free and open source.
While some work and money are required to make this into a certified system ready for use in public elections, the advantages could be significant.
If 5-yr old PCs can be used, it's hard to imagine a less expensive voting system.
This revolutionary product is an example of an Electronic Ballot Printer (EBP). In this case, no information about the voter or the selections made are stored on the voting machine. The only artifact is the printed paper ballot produced once the voter finishes indicating choices. The selections are printed in plain text and encoded in a barcode (duplicated on each long edge).
As demonstrated in the January 12th straw poll in San Luis Obispo County, we intend that the ballots be counted at the poll site once the ballot box is opened at the close of the polls. The data read from the barcode is to be publicly displayed so everyone can see the tallies incremented.
By Friday, we had the software prepared and Saturday's event has to go down as a great success for Open Voting Consortium and the cause of transparent election administration (to others, I suppose, it was mainly about success for Obama). The response was overwhelmingly positive. We used the Ubuntu (Linux) operating system, which is also free and open source. As always, our code is publicly available [1].
I want to thank everyone that made this happen. On our side, THE GREAT Jan Kärrman of Sweden did the heavy lifting preparing the code. Asheesh Laroia wrote the tabulation program (100 lines of Python code) on Friday afternoon. Brent Turner went with me and video taped everything and conducted a number of interviews along the way. I also want to thank all of those involved in previous OVC demos because the software we used yesterday was based on these efforts -- going back to 2003. So, thanks to Fred McLain, who was the development lead for our APR 2004 demo that got such great reviews. David Mertz, Arthur Keller, Ed Cherlin, and Laird Popkin helped get the demo project going in 2003. Thanks to them. Thanks also to all of the other developers involved, including Eron Lloyd and John-Paul Gignac. All the past (esp. Doug Jones) and current OVC board members also deserve credit. And, of course, the OVC project only continues because scores of individuals continue to provide financial support. Thanks to them.
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