Election year is already upon the Americans. It seems like yesterday that I was standing in front of the capital in Austin, TX, gawking at all the Bush supporters. At the time, I had only recently moved and felt like I was watching playoff sports but had no team to root for. The game then proceeded into quintuple overtime and even the penalty shootout didn’t seem to settle who had won.
Now if there is any government agency which needs to hire usability people, it’s got to be the I.R.S. According to this Associated Press article, it takes “28 hours and 30 minutes to complete an average tax return with itemized deductions and income reported from interest, dividends and capital gains.” Sheesh… that’s got to be the worst time on task I’ve ever heard of. The I.R.S. would do well to learn from online e-tailers like Amazon: first off, when taking someone’s money, please make it ‘one-click’ easy! Heck, if they structure it right, we might end up wanting to add just a couple more taxes to our ledgers so we can get free shipping (or filing, rather).
Although I’m generally not a fan of partisan sites (which is how I ended up annoying Craig of craigslist), I’m going to put up a link to DrivingVotes.org. Along with Voter Virgin, and Rock the Vote they are achieving the very important nonpartisan goal of getting more eligible voters registered. Probably the most shocking fact about the 2000 election for me was the pitiful turnout. While everyone quibbled over a couple thousand ballots in Florida, few mentioned the 100 million people that just didn’t bother to vote. Generally, I’m very excited about the internet’s ability to elevate political discourse while simulataneously making it more accessible. I better stop the post here, however, lest Craig sends his vast armies to destroy us.
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The Puck Stops Here : Using a tablet PC and DVR technology, the San Jose Sharks can review in game video footage on the bench during the game. - Comment »
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