Today we saw the US election ballot being sent out to early voters here in New York state and what a SenseMaking nightmare it is folks. It looks like the Board of Elections in New York did not learn anything from that last US election. What happened to the much ballyhooed “Design for Democracy” work done by the AIGA here in Manhattan? Was there no uptake right here in New York state?
Imagine senior citizens trying to figure out this ballot! It lists Obama/Biden in two different columns and McCain/Palin in three different columns with no explanation as to why. The entire multi-year election process comes down to these tiny little ovals on a ballot form! The creators of this document have evidently decided that the needs of the processing machine are more important than the cognitive needs of the humans attempting to fill out this form. When there is so much invested in this election process and so much at stake it boggles the mind to see this important instrument done so poorly. With a little SenseMaking brainpower this could have been designed so much more effectively for everyone of voting age. Keep your fingers crossed that next week voters across the country can figure out the myriad of ballots awaiting them. Honestly our government must start doing a much better job with democracy related instruments if democracy is to survive. In its present form this early ballot instrument is unfortunately not representative of a leading nation. Come on folks we can do better than this!
PS: We are interested in all other US election 2008 ballots so feel free to send your scans to research (at) humantific (dot) com
