Blind ballots

>A friend just forwarded a note about a web-based secret ballot being 
>developed for use in the US for the blind.

I don't know why there has to be a special blind Web ballot. An 
accessible Web ballot works for blind and sighted voters.

>For most people, using a voting machine behind a curtain or marking 
>a print ballot in a curtained booth is secret, but for the blind 
>using these means, they must convey their intent to someone else in 
>order to use them.

That is not true. The last three elections I've voted in that used 
paper ballots provided hard plastic templates that fit over the 
circles in which you draw an X. A staffmember reads the names of all 
candidates one after another. All you have to remember is which 
circle to mark. You step behind the screen and write an X in that 
circle. No one knows your vote.

A mobility-impaired person has different needs, and the computerized 
voting system I had to use last year was entirely inaccessible to 
pretty much everyone who could not lean directly over a VGA 
monochrome LCD and touch a single character cell with a very tightly 
tethered special pen. But with paper ballots, there is no necessary 
inaccessibility to the blind.
-- 
         Joe Clark | joeclark@joeclark.org
         Weblogs, resources, & articles by the hundreds:
         <http://joeclark.org> | <http://fawny.org>
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Received on Saturday, 6 October 2001 09:45:59 UTC