Monday, April 28, 2008

Uncle Sam Wants You to Text


It seems like texting your vote has become quite commonplace with television shows, such as American Idol. When you see your favorite Idol on the screen, you open up your phone, text “7” to “1234” and your vote is tallied. Simple, right?

What if the same concept was used for voting in the Presidential Elections? According to Eric Zeman’s article, “People Would Use Cell Phones to Vote For President If They Could” on Information Week’s OvertheAir Blog, a poll taken by Samsung proved this idea to be very popular among its participants.

While I see this as an easy solution for voters who can’t make it to the polls on time (let’s face it, many of us have a long commute these days), I just don’t see it working. There are several sections on the ballot in which the citizens vote for (state, county, city, ect.) and text messaging would either overlook these sections or cause a huge mess. There are several other questions that lead me to believe text-voting for the Presidential Election is not a fool proof plan. How would they tally these votes? Also, how would they identify that citizen?

This concept seems like a lot of work and if it were to appear in our lives, it wouldn’t be for several years. If it did exist, I don’t think I’d do it. I prefer to go inside a booth, review my choices and vote, knowing that I did my job as a citizen of this country.

What do you think about voting for President via text message? Would you do it? Do you think it will work?

Kimberly Salesky
Marketing Assistant

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