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Ask HN: Why are election results shown at the end?

1 points by Ahmd72 ↗ HN
This is a question mainly for pro-democracy and free speech supporters, with the amount of growth in technology, why are election count results shown at the end? Why can we not have a counter right at the booth or on the ballet box that gives the count as soon as a vote is cast? To me this counting ballet box seems an outdated method, that's used only to change the results at the end. Does anyone have suggestions as to how can we improve the democratic election process where we truly can see in real-time as votes are cast? How can technology improve it?

9 comments

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byoung2
Wouldn't that cause an observer effect? If I see my candidate is losing by a landslide maybe I'll change my vote. But I would have been influenced by incomplete data
Ahmd72
Why would an already cast vote be changed? Or do you mean the people who will vote at the end stages? Would it matter if you change your loyalties at the end then?
byoung2
I thought you meant the count is updated as people vote and that count is made public. So if candidate A and B are neck and neck and I had planned on voting for candidate C who is trailing, after seeing that number I might vote for candidate B instead
Ahmd72
True but this happens already, so each of the candidate's election teams or people on the ground in that area are already getting a rough of estimate of how many votes their candidate is getting and if they have resources they can bring in more people to vote for their candidate, this is especially true for poorer countries where people sell their votes for money. Also do you think this is a big enough problem that someone is changing who to vote for at the end if they are only being influenced by their own mind and not external factors? After all it is their right who to vote for.
ocdtrekkie
Voting is very, very decentralized. Votes are conducted at the county level, which is then reported to the state, which then reports to the federal government. The laws each state and even county have on how votes are conducted differ, so different methods are often used, and of course, because of the electoral college, the straight count doesn't always matter anyways.

So, at least for the Presidential election, there's a lot of reason not to do this. It'd also probably be bad to have the counter increment in a voting place when you submit your ballot, because then you would see how the person in front of you just voted, which we don't want, so people aren't bullied about how they voted.

And finally, technology does not actually solve problems: It trades problems we have for new and potentially bigger problems. For instance, if you are reliant on a digital system for counting votes, it is easier to tamper with and harder to verify that tampering has occurred. This is why if you want to be sure your vote actually was counted correctly, you should always vote on a paper ballot if it is offered in your district.

Ahmd72
I believe the process is decentralized but not the results which are easily manipulated, every time a election happens anywhere in the world we hear that it was not correctly conducted, cheating happened and so on. Just look at the recent Russian interference everyone is talking about.

If we believe in free speech and that everyone has the right to do what they want, why should we be afraid of being bullied about who we voted for? I would say more damage is done by hiding your vote, further I believe this is the real problem and hiding our votes is not the correct solution for it.

True, but if I had a counter that increments the minute I vote then atleast I as an individual can know it is correct and it can be easily shown everywhere else too.

jfk13
> I had a counter that increments the minute I vote then atleast I as an individual can know it is correct

Only if you assume nobody else is voting at the same time as you. So that isn't really any use.

Ahmd72
There are already queues at the ballot box so I am pretty much the only one voting at that time, same will happen at the other ballot boxes and then the results aggregated.
ocdtrekkie
The problem is if you feel like you will be judged for how you vote, it may change how you vote.