Filed under: Software, iPhone, App Store, iPod touch
Prepare for Election Day with your iPhone
Here at the TUAW home office, we're quite distracted by the pending election of the USA's 44th President. However, since this is an Apple blog, we can't go all political -- but we can combine our interests.Here are four ways you can prepare for the big day with your iPhone.
1. Quiz yourself about the candidates
How well do know the man who'll receive you vote? Fit 2 Vote [App Store link] displays a quote made by either John McCain or Barack Obama. Your job is to identify the quote's origin. Once you've correctly attributed 50 quotes, you're deemed "fit to vote." Fit 2 Vote costs $0.99US.
2. Report on your polling place
Vote Report [App Store link] is the mobile end of the Twitter Vote Report, a network of software developers, designers, and others that allows voters to instantly share the conditions at their polling places. Use your iPhone to alert the media, your neighbors, friends or anyone involved about wait times, machine malfunctions, and especially clever signs in the parking lot. Vote Report is free.
[Incidentally, has anyone ever, in the history of democracy, been swayed by a posterboard sign viewed minutes before voting? You've got to wonder why those people are standing out there in the rain.]
3. Track live results
By now the rhetoric has nearly died down and all that's left is the results. Election [App Store link] provides real-time polling results that can be sorted by state, candidate, percentage and more. You can even limit the results to your candidate, and best of all, there's no stumping. Election only reports the numbers. Election costs $0.99US.
4. Perform electoral math
Votetastic [App Store link] lets you fiddle with electoral votes and observe the results. For instance, you can select a contested state like Ohio and either turn it "red" or "blue." Doing so moves those electoral votes from one side to the other.
Votetastic is really more of a game than a tool, as it doesn't report on real data, but it could be fun to see if your own predictions come true. Votetastic costs $0.99US
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jon said 1:06PM on 11-03-2008
Also, don't forget to track Twitter in real time with Summizer on the iPhone: http://www.mustacheinc.com/summizer
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Vince said 1:17PM on 11-03-2008
Final prediction: Obama 338 - McCain 200
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Nick Park said 1:24PM on 11-03-2008
I'm sure some folks get influenced by a small sign outside the polling place especially if there are a bias towards signs for one candidate. There's even evidence that the type of location you vote in influences how you vote: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2008/06/24/where-you-vote-could-influence-how-you-vote/
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Jash Sayani said 1:44PM on 11-03-2008
Ya.. Phones are helping a lot for campaigning.... I saw the Obama 08 iPhone app in AppStore the other day.....
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Marc said 4:46PM on 11-03-2008
Dave,
You've got an incorrect link in there for "Election." Yours points to "Poll Tracker '08 by Slate" which apparently has some pretty bad reviews.
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KeynoteKen said 5:30PM on 11-03-2008
Use SVG to try out your own electoral scenarios here
http://www.theelectoralvote.com/svg.html
One of the few web electoral maps NOT based on Flash so it works nicely on the iPhone. So does this one
http://homepage.mac.com/makentosh/2008/today.html
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domblondje said 6:24PM on 11-03-2008
And don't forget the 5th option to follow the elections via online radio Apps like 'StreamItAll RADIO' or others.
No mather where I am, I can listen to my favorite radio station which isn't even broadcasting anywhere near me...
( http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=286474488&mt=8 )
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Greta said 6:58PM on 11-03-2008
Why wait? The pumpkins have already predicted a winner. That's right. A pumpkin chuckin' of pumpkins drawn up by 7th and 8th graders at American Renaissance Middle School was held in Statesville, North Carolina. The orange gourds were hurled by trebuchets built at Mitchell Community College. Yes, this was a stunt to build publicity for the Crossroads Pumpkin Fest, held the first Saturday of November.
The McCain/Palin ticket narrowly defeated Obama/Biden by 4 yards. The hotly contested U.S. Senate race pitted North Carolina State Senator Kay Hagan against U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole. The Hagan pumpkin won hands down - and later Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory beat North Carolina Lt. Governor Beverly Perdue in the governor's race. To find out which heads flew left or right, log onto www.thegreatheadsofstatesvilleexitpoll.blogspot.com
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Jon Hege said 6:57PM on 11-03-2008
If voting changed anything they'd make it illegal.
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profcrayzee said 7:43PM on 11-03-2008
votetastic doesn't have a map. The app store reviews seem to favor electionmap from nth parallel which can also load live data. I downloaded it and it does look quite good.
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PSM said 8:33PM on 11-03-2008
I'd like to follow the results, but I just can't bring myself to pay a dollar for an app that will be marginally useful for one day.
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