Diebold Voting systems and what can we do with them

[Stoic]

I live in Maryland where we once had one of the best voting systems in the country (paper ballot) and now have the worst- Diebold. If you can make it even more worse they have. Now when the voter sidles up to the table his/her name is checked, not against a paper list of names from the voting rolls, but off of a lcd screen database. Now it's just one more piece of technology that can fail and the voter will be sent home without casting a ballot.

The Democratic majority state legislature simply won't address the problem with electronic voting because, in my opinion, they don't want to look like "idiots" for dropping $50 million plus on this turkey. Plus there are a couple of Democratic committee leaders who held up paper trail legislation because the Republican governor was for it. Not everyone in the Leg is an idiot. My personal hero is Delegate Liz Bobo who spearheaded the push for a paper trail. (Thanks, Liz! She's running for re-election and you can send her some love and a donation at www.lizbobo.com.)

My question is: What can we do with the Diebold touchscreen systems if they are removed from the voting process? How can they be "re-purposed". Maybe we can reprogram them and use them at state parks and state monuments as tourist information kiosks? I appreciate any ideas I can pass on. We've got to get rid of these things.

[Jackpine Radical]

1. They might work as boat anchors.

[Warpy]

3. Too light

but the touch screens can be recycled separately and the bases, with the bottom removed, might make attractive urban windowboxes.

Or we can send them to a thermal depolymerization setup and have them turned back into oil.

The information kiosk idea sounds pretty good, but the occasional hacker would program disinformation to send hapless tourists to the local sewage treatment plant, instead.

BTW, the story was one of the headlines at MSGOP.com.

[melissinha]

4. I second that motion, or print cat food coupons

I really don't think we should be concerned with the machines who have contributed to billions of deficit spending.


But we could all use cat food coupons cause at the rate the Republican Controlled Congress, executive courts and media are going, we will need it.

[stellanoir]

2. You may want to pose that inquiry to the wizards over at

Make Magazine. http://www.makezine.com/

One of their specialties is converting electronical equipment for obtuse functions other than their originally designed purposes.

They're very smart, innovative, and VERY funny.

[Cobalt Violet]

5. If we can't get rid of them, hack them.

What else is left to do with them?

[skids]

6. The units themselves...

...are pretty much valueless. Hardware today is dirt cheap -- all the cost is in the contracts, software licensing, and staff training. The money has pretty much been thrown down a deep black well, since foisting the machines off on another state would be reprehensible.

As computing platforms they are not worth the trouble, however, these machines might become a favorite geek fad item if and when they are finally purged from use. I would advise the state to hang onto them and then hold an auction once that occurs. Barring a successful lawsuit against Deibold which requires their return, that's about the only thing I can think of to salvage the cost.

(There is an OpenSource voting system project that might be coaxed to run on them, were it certified, but as I said as machines, they aren't worth that much.)

[Hawkowl]

7. Chesapeake Bay

I think Maryland residents should dress up like Indians, raid an elections office and throw them into the Chesapeake Bay al la the Boston Tea Party.

O.k. if you can't break into the elections office, if the Dems were able to buy a few dozen Diebold machines, and stage a Media event of people dressed up like Indians throwing the machines into the Chesapeake, reenacting the Boston Tea Party it could get some press. You could even take a page out of Rove's book and notify the media that an elections office was broken into to increase the hype, and then issue a correction after the event.

[Stinky The Clown]

8. I just spoke with Liz's office

(I've known Liz a loooooooong time .... she's a real activist and helped our neighborhood out with some matters when she was on the County Council)

Paula Hollinger is the one who sat on the bill in the senate for exactly the reason you cite - Ehrlich was for it.

In any case, Liz will connect us up with TrueVote, with whom she's been working on this.

As to your question ..... how about we auction them off on ebay as educational devices that one can use to reverse engineer software. :)

[peace13]

9. Drop them in the hole at the World Trade Center

and cover them with dirt. A foundation that would mark the rebirth of America!

[razors edge]

10. Build our own bush library

and fill it from top to bottom with them.

nothing fancy, just a little brown shack out back, with a star and a cresent cut out of the door.

[eppur_se_muova]

11. Artificial reefs? They do this with unseaworthy ships.

Maybe artificial weasel dens would be more appropriate.