News & Insights

We’re Making History in Real Time.

Our timely insights share informed perspectives on the rapidly evolving story of Election Technology, as it unfolds.

Three-Step Test for "Open Source"

To our elections official stakeholders, Chief Technology Officer John Sebes covers a point that seems to be popping up in discussions more and more.  There seems to be some confusion about what "open source" means in the context of software used for election administration or voting. That's understandable, because some election I.T. folks, and some current vendors, may not be familiar with the prior usage of the term "open source" -- especially since it is now used in so many different ways to describe (variously), people, code, legal agreements, etc. So, John hopes to get our Stakeholders back to basics on this.

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On the Civic Technology Landscape, the TrustTheVote Project is an Atypical Structure

So where does the TrustTheVote Project fit in the broader “civic tech” movement that so many people in the technology world write and talk about? This is the first of two posts on this thought.

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David Plouffe’s View of the Future of Voting — We Agree and Disagree

David Plouffe, President Obama’s top political and campaign strategist and the mastermind behind the winning 2008 and 2012 campaigns, wrote a forward-looking op-ed [paywall] in the Wall Street Journal recently about the politics of the future and how they might look.

He touched on how technology will continue to change the way campaigns are conducted – more use of mobile devices, even holograms, and more micro-targeting at individuals. But he also mentioned how people might cast their votes in the future, and that is what caught our eye here at the TrustTheVote Project.  There is a considerable chasm to cross between vision and reality.

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