Electech

With the ever growing innovations in computer and internet technology, a campaign manager would be a fool not to utilize these resources to gain awareness about their candidate. However this election more than in years prior, technology played a huge role in encouraging people to get to the poles and vote regardless of their political stance. Facebook, Google, and Twitter were just a few social media and information sites that got directly involved by raising awareness about the election. Facebook sent out a notification to all of its subscribed users that told them about the election and that they should take the time out of their day to vote. Google was able to send out a mass email to all of the Gmail, Google Calender, and Google Plus users informing people about the election as well as providing a link to figure out where they would be able to vote on election day. On the micro-blog twitter, election day hash tags were trending all day from reputable accounts that spread awareness about the polls and how people could register to vote.
Technology aided small counties by allowing voters to cast their ballots anywhere inside its borders. This means that rather than having a set voting location, the residents of said county would be able to vote anywhere in the county. In Collin County, Texas, there were projected as many as 100,000 additional voters who will vote on election day due to this new technology. Virgin America developed a technology that allowed their customers who were on their flights to registers to vote at their seat while they were waiting to arrive at their destination. This provided an ease in the process of registering to vote which would be directly related to the number of people that would actually show up to cast their ballot on election day.

Another amazing technological innovation that is new this election is the QR code. A QR code can be scanned by any smartphone and will bring you instantly to a website. An organization by the name of Rock the Vote took this technology and made tee shirts featuring a QR code that when scanned would take the person to a website where they can register to vote. It was estimated that over 1 million people were able to register to vote using this technology.

Cited:

"Election 2012 Goes High Tech: QR Codes Bring 1.5 Million New Voters to the Polls? | QR Droid Zapper | Blog." QR Droid Zapper | Homepage. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Nov. 2012. <http://qrdroid.com/blog/election-2012-goes-high-tech.html>.