November 02, 2004

How'd your vote go?

As important as this particular presidential election is, I’m more interested in the longer term factors affecting the voting process in the US. The electoral college system, how the media’s election day coverage influences voter turnout, the construction and dissemination of information to voters by state and federal authorities, the voting process…basically the user experience of voting.

So if you’ve voted today (or earlier by absentee ballot), I’d like to ask you: how did your voting experience go? Any problems? How did you find out where to go and when? Did you vote using a computer? Any better/worse than a paper ballot? Were election officials helpful? Was there anything in particular you wished had been done differently? If you planned on voting and were unable to, what was the reason? Those are just suggested questions…basically I’d just like you to share the story of your voting experience, from registering to the actual voting process. In sharing our stories, maybe we can have some effect on changing what doesn’t work for the next election. Thanks.

Update: Lots of great responses so far (over 200 of them). Thank you and keep ‘em coming! See also some election day images from Flickr (here’s a shot from inside my voting booth).