election
Latest
All hail Thrall: Supreme Leader of Azeroth
As promised, we now announce the Supreme Leader of Azeroth. And the Winner is- Thrall! Thrall carried a lead throughout the election and ended the race with 55.3 percent of the both, more than either of the Alliance candidates combined. Lady Jaina Proudmore finished the race in second place with 34.3 percent of the vote. King Magni Bronzebeard was disappointed in his 10.4% share of the vote, and has promised a better showing in future elections. %Poll-11649%
2008's April Fools' DS pranks
Oh man, is that Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime over there, bringing you a giant bag of popcorn? It must be your lucky day!Too bad it's April Fools' Day! You're not getting any popcorn at all! Nope, it's just another bag of the usual stuff -- disappointment, regret, and the simple pain of living.Rather than spend your day weeping over missed opportunities and movie snacks, why not peruse our collection of April Fools' Day DS pranks? We've gathered up all of this year's handheld shenanigans we could find around the internet, providing you a concentrated punch of lulz to counteract Reggie's kick to your head. Click Reggie for popcorn! ->
WoW Insider Show, Episode 30: Not completely about patch 2.4
Man, with all the patch 2.4 news flying around today, you might feel a little overwhelmed. Well, worry no more, because just when you need something a little silly and lighthearted, the WoW Insider Show comes right along, with Episode 30 now available on WoW Radio and iTunes. This past Saturday, Turpster and I, along with Amanda Dean and Elizabeth Wachowski of WoW Insider, had a sit down to talk about all of the biggest news in the past week of Warcraft, including, but not limited to: Our favorite trinkets (mine I picked only because the tooltip uses the word "fecundity") What "counts" in terms of leveling as fast as possible Elizabeth talked to us for a bit about the lore of the Burning Crusade, and both the high and low points of it We chatted about the best starting areas in the game (there was a strange split over the Dwarf/Gnome area for some reason as well) And finally we hit on Amanda's Azerothian General Election, which you can still vote on right now -- Thrall is still winning, so Alliance, you better grab your sword and fight the Horde. We did check in reader email, too, and Turpster says he's headed to 70, so we asked for your input on what kind of reward (or punishment) we can give him if he makes it before Wrath -- if you have a suggestion, email us at theshow@wow.com.And speaking of Turpster, you've got to see his new TurpsterVision over at Massively today -- it's a spectacular tale of a galaxy long ago and far away, if you know what I mean.
Azerothean General Election
The results of the primary elections are in. In an unsurprising landslide victory, Thrall was confirmed as leader of the Horde faction by capturing 69.7% of the vote. The bitter race on Alliance side led to a down-to-the-wire victory for Dwarven King Magni Bronzebeard who pulled in 24.9% of the vote. A distraught High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind, who received 24.5% was denied a recount in the Wetlands. It is time for the final election for Supreme Leader of Azeroth.
Election Reminder
The Azrothean primary elections are coming to close. Unsurprisingly, Thrall is a runaway candidate for leader of the Horde. The Warchief is carrying 70% of the vote, the closest competitor Lady Sylvanas Windrunner has only 14.8%. Thrall is currently preparing his campaign team for the general election. Windrunner is rumored to be preparing her forces for non-political endeavors. The Alliance race is neck and neck and neck between Highlord Bolvar Fordragon, King Magni Bronzebeard(24.1%), and High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind. The latest polls show the King with a slight advantage (24.4%) over the High Priesstess (24.1%) and the Highlord (21.3%). Both High Tinker Gelbin Mekkatorque and Prophet Velen are reportedly stepping up their campaigns in hopes of come-behind victory. At this point it's anyone's race. Due to overwhelming support from write-in voters, Lady Jaina Proudmoore has decided to enter the election contest as an independent candidate. She would like to thank everyone for their support and promises an excellent running in the general election. Remember to vote for your candidate by March 20, 2008. Rock (paper, scissors) the vote!
Breakfast Topic: Electing a leader for the Horde (Poll)
Yesterday we began the primary election to name a leader for the Alliance . So far it's a close race between Highlord Bolvar Fordragon, King Magni Bronzebeard, and High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind. Lady Jaina Proudmoore stands out as a highly regarded write-in candidate, and may well win her way to an independent nomination of the final ballot. Today we stand ready to select a leader over the entire Horde faction. Many have already begun campaigning for Thrall, possibly mistaking him for a member of the Alliance.
Breakfast Topic: Who should be leader of the free world (of Azeroth)? (Poll)
Here in the States it's election season. Newspapers and websites are plastered with campaign information. Preliminary polling for both factions will close on March 20, 2008. Then the leaders will go head to head, vying for the leader of the World... of Warcraft. Feel free to campaign in the comments for your candidate of choice. Who should serve as the leader of the Alliance?
Yahoo details gaming-friendly presidential candidates
We don't want to be thought of as single-issue voters. But we'd be lying if we didn't admit we look a little more favorably on politicians who we imagine might pick up a controller from time to time, in much the same way that people in Philadelphia are legally obligated to vote for a candidate they see eating a cheese steak sandwich at Pat's King of Steaks.So this recent voting guide from Yahoo! Games has proved invaluable for us, and we're betting you can learn a little something too. (Spoiler alert: Obama and McCain are the most gaming-friendly on their respective sides of the aisle.) No, it may not be the only guide you need to the race, but if you're on the fence, it may just help to push you over.[Via GamePolitics]
Video game industry seeks political clout
The strange relationship between the video game industry and politics just got more complicated. Mike Gallagher, president of the Entertainment Software Association, spoke with the New York Times today about his intentions to start a political action committee (PAC) for making campaign contributions. The PAC -- which represents major publishers like Disney, Electronic Arts, Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony -- was approved by the board last fall and will reportedly be ready to go in March.Gallagher estimated the PAC would donate $50,000 to $100,000 to national candidates this year, a number which he labels as small, but a good start. He also talked about combining contribution efforts with the ESA initiative Video Game Voters Network. "If I can walk into the office of a member of Congress and tell them we have 20,000 voters in their state who are already signed up to write letters and act based on game-related issues that concern them, that's powerful," he said. You know what also helps? Money; good thing that's covered too. We're interested in seeing how game rhetoric on Capitol Hill changes, if at all, following the PAC initiative.[Via Game Politics]
Today's most political video and game: Kung-Fu Election
Atom Films hosts Kung-Fu Election, a Mortal Kombat knock-off fighting game starring Republican and Democratic primary front-runners. While the game is fairly deep -- boasting three attack buttons plus special moves -- the intro video snared us. Who knew Obama could shred like that?See the non-embeddable video, play the game, then tell us how far you fared in the democratic primary tournament. [Via AdRants]
Ron Paul's World of Warcraft rally
On New Year's day supporters of Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul gathered on the Whisperwind (US) realm in World of Warcraft to march across Azeroth and show their support for their candidate of choice. The rally started outside Ironforge with approximately 240 players (with 400 members in their RP Revolution guild) and traveled to Stormwind, Westfall, Booty Bay, Ratchet, and finally Orgrimmar. And if you didn't make it, you can still experience the rally vicariously via our image gallery below (and if you did make it, feel free to send screenshots to us at aroundazeroth@wow.com!) or video above!To the best of our knowledge, this was the first political rally to be held in World of Warcraft -- and looking at their numbers it seems to have been a successful and upbeat gathering (or at least it was upbeat for the participants). Will this event help Ron Paul's chances in the election? It's hard to say until the votes are cast, but the uniqueness of the event is causing it to get a lot of media coverage. (And no press is bad press, so long as they spell your name properly, right?) Read on for impressions of the event.%Gallery-12524%
Ron Paul wins WoW's presidential naming race
With Iowa's first in the nation presidential nominating caucuses coming tomorrow, and New Hampshire's primaries following early next week, pundits and observers across the nation are closely watching the polls and prediction markets for early word on who might win. But these pundits might be ignoring a potentially important leading indicator of political opinion. We're talking, of course, about World of Warcraft character names.As pointed out by blogger Andrew Sullivan, a full 48 realms in the popular online game have a player-characters named after Republican candidate Ron Paul (player names must be unique to a realm). The WoW naming support for Paul isn't that surprising given the recent in-game rally held in his honor in Whisperwind's IronForge. Paul runs well ahead of his closest competitor, Democrat Barack Obama, who shares a name with 36 WoW characters. No other candidate breaks the ten-character mark in a search of World of Warcraft info. resource The Armory.While naming a WoW character after your favorite politician seems a great way to show your support, it's not always possible. For one, names longer than twelve characters are not allowed, meaning supporters of Hillary Clinton or Bill Richardson couldn't use their full names for a WoW character. Even shortened names don't always work -- in our tests, characters named HillClinton, HClinton and just plain old Clinton were deemed "unavailable." This likely means the Clinton name has run afoul of Blizzard's terms of use clause against using character names that belong "to a popular culture figure, celebrity, or media personality." (This is also probably why there are no characters named BillClinton or GeorgeWBush. There are 29 GeorgeW's though).While tracking WoW's presidential naming race is fun and all, it probably has very little actual value in predicting nationwide voting preferences. After all, there are 71 characters named Trogdor, and no one really expects him to burninate across the 2008 elections.Read on for a complete list of WoW's presidential candidate name counts, as of press time.(Thanks to WowInsider's Elizabeth Harper for help with this story)
New MMO: Luminary: Rise of the GoonZu
Now, before you say anything, just bear in mind that sometimes a name just doesn't translate well outside of its country of origin. Obviously, this is one of those names, and it's unfortunate, because Luminary: Rise of the GoonZu sounds like an admirable attempt at something completely new.Check it out: an MMO in which you play in such a way as to rise through the ranks of society, gathering supporters and momentum to attempt to attain the highest rank. From the press release: "Simulating a real world society, players in Luminary: Rise of the GoonZu can become an artisan and create their own items. Sell these items in the market and build your wealth. Purchase town stocks, lease buildings and even employ your own workforce. Have you earned the respect of your fellow players? Run for office in the residential election and become the GoonZu and control the server's future."That sounds totally amazing, and a breath of fresh air, frankly. No mention of combat, monsters, level grinding, etc. Looking at the game's website brings all of that stuff in force, but I'm still very interested. However, I can see its name working against it; do you want to become the GoonZu? Though what do I know? Tons of people play Dofus all the time.[Thanks, Robin!]
CBS gears up for HD election coverage
Seeing our current president in HD just isn't enough for CBS, which is "readying its technical plant in order to broadcast both political conventions in summer 2008 in high-definition." Reportedly, the network is hoping to have its new HD control room ready to roll for the Democratic National Convention in Denver next August and the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis the month after. Furthermore, CBS is also looking to beam out the Evening News with Katie Couric in glorious HD, which should become a very real possibility as soon as the aforementioned control room is fully overhauled.
Diebold says e-voting sales have failed
According to an AP article released today, Diebold, one of the prominent makers of the recently embattled electronic voting machines, says that the company has failed to make its e-voting business profitable. If you'll recall, Diebold machines have repeatedly been the target of various hacks, many of which have proven the machine to be susceptible to intrusion from outside elements and thus unreliable from a security standpoint. The company has reduced its revenue outlook by $120 million, and has plans to allow its e-voting unit to operate more independently, giving the team its own board of directors and possibly a new management structure. To complete the overhaul of the ailing division, the company will also change the name of the branch from "Diebold Election Systems" to the starkly different "Premier Election Systems." Diebold blames the "rapidly evolving political uncertainties and controversies surrounding state and jurisdiction purchases of electronic voting systems," for much of its problems... as opposed to the fact that they currently produce faulty, unprotected, and unreliable machines.
Fresh study (still) finds Diebold e-voting machines hacker-friendly
The fact that some individuals still have any level of faith left in Diebold is quite baffling, but in case you were looking for just one more episode to dash your hopes of a hack-proof voting machine, open wide. As fate would have it, a fresh study in Florida has found that even optical scan voting systems "can be hacked into," which is causing quite a bit of concern considering that touchscreen alternatives aren't exactly an option in the Sunshine State. Reportedly, the document noted that "official memory cards in the optical scan machines could easily be exchanged with ones altering the vote count," and it was also stated that Diebold must "deal with the flaws" by August 17th. Yeah, we're sure it's all over that.[Thanks, Josh]
iVotronic e-voting software issues to blame in Florida polemic?
Oddly enough, it seems that the Sunshine State attracts more than just tourists and nice weather, as Florida is now facing yet another round of e-voting woes long after elections have ended. While Diebold machines certainly administered their fair share of fits, now iVotronic's own systems are purportedly to blame for a controversial election in Sarasota County last November. Upon further review, officials noticed "symptoms consistent with a known software flaw" in the aforementioned machine, which countered the "county officials' claims that a bug played no role in the election results." Of course, this won't mark the first time that late-blooming documents shed light on a potential voting mishap, but it seems that both parties are standing their ground on this one. Apparently, the issues were spotted during the primary election, but since they appeared on a "smaller scale," they weren't adequately addressed. Currently, no individuals have been legally blamed for their deceptive handling of the probable mishap, but we'd seriously suggest that Florida thinks mighty hard before loosing these flawed machines on the public next time around.
Estonians first to cast national votes online
For a lucky group of Eastern European cyber-voters, e-voting no longer entails traveling to an official location to poke at a screen -- let's just hope they managed to shake off e-voting's penchant for fraud while they were at it. Nationwide voting in cyberspace has finally become a reality in, of all places, Estonia. Eeeh? Yep. Estonia's been keen on the idea of voting via the internet since 2001 and became the first country in the world to hold legit general elections when they implemented the remote e-voting process locally in 2005. As of this week, they own yet again with over 30,000 of 940,000 eligible Estonians casting virtual ballots in the world's first online parliamentary election. Online voters even have the option to re-vote with a paper ballot in the event that hurried or pressured decisions were made from their remote voting locations. This option is evidently proving to be an effective way to boost voter turnout, which was only 58 percent in 2003. Let's hope this "using the internet to encourage voting" trend catches on in some other countries (ahem) that also suffer from less-than-impressive election turnouts.
DS Daily: The democratic process
Well, it looks like the next Presidential campaign is already well under way in the good ol' U.S. of A., so it must be time for us to ask a preliminary election question: how big is the issue of videogame legislation to you? For those of you who will be voting, is this one of of your major issues when evaluating candidates? In a time of war, this may seem like a small issue to some, but it's one that affects us pretty much every day. So, what we want to know is how you feel about candidates who support heavier regulation of video game content?
Obama: 'Stop playing GameBoy'
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is fired up to win this election like it's 1999. Stopping in Texas, Obama spoke to a group of youths about recruiting their friends for his campaign and said, "I want you to tell them, 'It's time for you to turn off the TV and stop playing GameBoy' ... We've got work to do."A good first step is for Obama's speech writer to learn this is the 2008 election. If we're going to be hip and cool, let's learn what the kids are actually playing. Words to use in the future are: Wii, PlayStation, Xbox, DS -- and N-Gage.[Thanks Obo]
