Electoral software

Electoral software is, simply put, software which is used in connection with elections; it can be for the purpose of winning elections, as is polling day or GOTV software like EARS. It can be for the purpose of predicting elections, as in UK Elect, or for counting Proportional Representation elections.

GOTV

Get out the vote (GOTV) software is designed to store canvassing information and correlate it with the electoral register - this is in order to identify who is to receive targeted literature so that third parties may be squeezed, supporters of certain opponents be informed of relevant information, and other market segmentation. On polling day, the software may be used to sort lists of electors who have not yet voted, in order to boost turnout.

Examples

EARS

EARS, the Election Agents Record System, designed by John Jefkins,Fact|date=December 2007 is a piece of electoral software used primarily by the Liberal Democrats to record canvassing statistics, plan polling day action and predict election results using the Richmond formula.

Bluechip

Bluechip was the British Conservative Party's proprietary electoral software until 2005 designed to store canvassing information. It was brought in under John Major after his successful 92 campaign. In the unsuccessful 2005 General election campaign Central Office it was integrated with data from experian (voltavote) in order to try and predict possible conservative party voters that had not been canvassed. It was also used to run telephone canvassing.

External links

* http://www.earsonline.co.uk