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Twitter, Internet Undermine Canada Election Rules
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| Parent(s) |
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| Contributor | Monsieur |
| Last Edited | Monsieur Nov 10, 2009 09:28pm |
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| Category | News |
| Author | Reuters |
| Media | Newspaper - New York Times |
| News Date | Wednesday, November 11, 2009 03:00:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | OTTAWA (Reuters) - Twitter 1, Elections Canada 0.
In this era of smartphones and the Internet, the federal elections agency is struggling to enforce a rule that bans the general broadcasting of voting results until all the polls have closed.
As Canadians in four electoral districts spread right across the giant country cast ballots on Monday to fill vacant seats in the House of Commons, Elections Canada asked a newspaper to remove from its website a story revealing initial results from one constituency where voting had ended early.
The rule -- part of the Canada Elections Act -- aims to prevent abuses in the world's second largest country. Canada has six time zones, which means results from the East start to come in while polls are still open in the rest of the country.
To head off the chance that the majority could somehow be influenced by early voting, media organizations are banned from nationally broadcasting any results until the last polling station has closed.
That said, television and radio stations can broadcast regional results as long as the signal is contained within that region. But this fails to take into account that a voter out West with the right kind of satellite dish can access an eastern station broadcasting results. |
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