Voting in St. Louis
So I voted this morning, and had my choice of voting (a) with a paper ballot; or (b) electronically. Having read much of what's come out about electronic voting machines, I was a little wary, and asked if it had a paper audit trail I could see. The lady at the desk said yes, it did. So I opted to go electronic.
Then began the waiting. There were two electronic machines, one of which was in direct view of the line of people waiting to use them. Fortunately there were only two people in front of me, so I waited patiently. Then I waited some more. And some more. 15 minutes later, one of the people looked like he was wrapping up, but it turned out he was just having a problem with the machine. He couldn't get his ballot cast. This didn't look so good. I began to be jealous of the paper voters, who have all come and gone twice now. Eventually the woman in front of me finished her vote and I could start mine.
From a hardware standpoint, the machine seemed well-engineered. It was clear where I should insert the card, and it handled my card very solidly. There was a box with a hinged cover to my right that (I presumed) would hold the printed ballot.
The software, however, left much to be desired. Imagine a web page and browser designed by a team consisting of a 5-year-old, and an apathetic computer science grad student. (This may have actually been intentional; the goal isn't to make it friendly for the computer literate, but for everyone.) The text on the screens made heavy use of mixed colors and lots of verbosity. If it takes this much to get me to understand what the machine is doing, then the machine is too complicated.
Once I figured out where the "Next" button was, my voting began. It started easy enough: I just touch the name I want to vote for, for each position. But then I accidentally hit the wrong name. What is your first instinct when you want to choose someone different? You touch the correct name. This had no effect. Was I stuck with the first name I touched? Do I have to touch "Back"? Do I have to reject my ballot and start over? On a hunch, I tried touching the incorrect name a second time, and this cleared the vote. Whew! (It's possible this was all explained in the first page or two of introduction, but I skipped most of it.)
I'd prepared for most of the amendments and propositions, but I skimmed the text just to be sure I didn't miss anything. Unfortunately, I wasn't prepared for the St. Louis City amendments and propositions, so I had to read through them. It wasn't easy reading. Unlike the state-level issues, the local ones were written in legalese. How do they expect everyday voters to understand this stuff? Not understanding the issues or the pros and cons, I couldn't cast a meaningful vote so I skipped them. I should have voted "no", just on principle.
Across from me, the gentleman that was there has gone and an elderly woman took his place. She immediately ran into problems with the machine apparently ejecting her card and telling her that her vote was canceled.
Finally, the machine and I were ready to cast my vote on paper. First I get to a "prepare to print" page. OK, I'm prepared. Let's get on with it. I touch "Next" and I hear some clicking in the box to my right. I open it up, but I don't see any votes inside. I'm on another "prepare to print" page. OK, I'm really prepared this time. "Print". The page changes subtly but is substantially similar to the "prepare to print" page I was just at. I hear some work in the box to my right, but I ignore it. Why am I still at this page? I touch "Print" again. And then it occurs to me: it's going through a page at a time. I open the box to see my second page of votes. I have it go through the next few pages and verify my choices. It then gives me the option to officially cast my vote.
I was pleased to see a paper trail, and it clearly and accurately marked my votes (the ones I saw, anyway). My only problem is the usability of the software. The user interface could be a little more intuitive and a little less "busy". A good UI shouldn't need instructions, especially the number that this one seemed to require. For an ATM manufacturer, I would have thought this would be obvious.
All in all, this was a good experience. I might do a paper ballot next time, though, just because it took less time, oddly.
(Photo by drdrewhonolulu.)