[As copied from my blog,
Live from the Nuke Free Zone.]
If you remember, I've mentioned that I'm a student in the School of Information Management and Systems at the University of California at Berkeley.
This morning, I received an interesting email on the list for all SIMS students from a fellow student and friend of mine, Joseph Hall. And here's what's up. Diebold, the company that makes the voting machine that my county (Alameda, in California) uses, among other things, is sending cease and desist letters to anybody who has a certain file that they don't want anybody to see. Joe explains it better at his blog. And there's another good post on the subject by another fellow student, Mary Hodder.
Anyway, this is serious. What is Diebold trying to hide from us? Why do they care so much that they're chasing people down with cease and desists? You see, voting is important, and trying to be as secretive as Diebold is does nothing but make you look suspicious. Especially when your CEO is on record that he's going to deliver Ohio for Bush in 2004.
This makes me a bit nervous because I vote on Diebold machines. And while I like the touchscreens, I really hate the lack of a paper trail. And with stuff like these memos make me really nervous for the future of the US and whether voting really matters anymore.
So, I've made the following decision. I'm joining the civil disobedience. This is too important not to. Grab the memos that Diebold wants hidden here, here, or here.
Hopefully, it will help.