Stories about Elections from October, 2012
Russia: DDoS Attacks Cripple Opposition's Online Vote
Eight hours after online voting for the Russian opposition's “Coordinating Council” began, unknown assailants launched a sustained Denial-of-Service attack against the Election Commission's website, disabling the primary voting portal.
Russia: Opposition Distracted by Virtual Elections, Loses Real Elections
In August, Global Voices reported on several activists from Russia’s protest movement running for office in local elections. They hoped it would be easier to win these small-scale contests, which took place last weekend. They were wrong, and the Coordinating Council election might be partly to blame.
Bermuda: Election Thoughts
Catch a fire blogs about Bermuda's elections – and offers a few predictions – while Respice Finem calls the right to vote “a right, not a privilege.”
United States: Hispanic Perspective on Second Presidential Debate
The second debate which took place in New York's Hofstra University on October 16th showed a much more energetic Barack Obama than in the first debate. Twitter saw high levels of activity surrounding the debate. According to reports, more than 100,000 tweets were recorded per minute when the subject of immigration arose.
Russia: Candidates Drop Out of Opposition Elections
On October 16 two high profile candidates in the opposition's Coordinating Council elections announced they are withdrawing from the campaign. Economist Irina Yasina and writer Liudmila Ulitskaya published a statement [ru] on Yasina's blog, explaining that there are other “younger” and more “active” “young people” involved in the process, and that...
Russia: Elections to Opposition Coordinating Council Fail to Attract Regional Voters
Leonid Volkov, the brains behind technical aspects of the coming independent opposition elections [ru], has posted an interesting bit of statistics [ru] on his blog. Out of the approximately 90,000 people currently registered to vote, 34.6% are from Moscow and Moscow Oblast, and 11.7% are from St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Oblast....
Montenegro: General Elections 2012
BalkanInsight's live blog [en] of this past Sunday's parliamentary elections in Montenegro ends its coverage with this summary: […] No surprises in the Montenegro elections, if the preliminary results are confirmed. [Milo Djukanovic] looks set to continue to dominate the political landscape as he has done for more than two...
The Venezuelan Elections, From Panama
The Venezuelan presidential elections were followed with interest in Panama, both by the Venezuelan community in the country and by Panamanians interested in what would happen in the neighboring country.
Venezuela: Post-Election Reflections
Emotions ran high on Sunday night after the official results of Venezuela's presidential elections were released. Part of the country celebrated the continuation of the 'Bolivarian Revolution' under President Hugo Chávez, while the other side lamented another electoral loss.
Bosnia & Herzegovina: Local Elections 2012
An Aussie in Bosnia writes – here and here – about the Oct. 7 local elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Related Twitter hashtags [bo, en] are #IzboriBiH and #IzboriBiH_RSE; the latter refers to Radio Slobodna Evropa, which runs this elections liveblog [bo], quoting [bo] Kenan Efendić (@Kenoslaw), among others: The...
Russia: Winners & Losers in Round 1 of the Opposition's Debates
The first stage of the Russian opposition's Coordinating Council debates has ended. So who has advanced to the next round of debates? Who among the candidates is best winning the hearts and minds of the opposition's voters?
Brazil: Electoral Propaganda Waste
On the aftermath of Brazilian municipal elections that took place on October 7, 2012, the Facebook page Quem suja agora vai sujar depois (Who messes now will mess afterwards) [pt] shares photos and videos showing electoral propaganda waste in streets across the country.
Arab World: Romney's Middle East Agenda Rapped
Mitt Romney's foreign policy speech was rapped by netizens across the Arab World today. If elected, Romney pledged to take a more “engaged” foreign policy, as opposed to Obama's wait-and-see approach as “profound upheaval” shook the region. He also said he would arm Syrian rebels.
Venezuela: Chávez Era to Extend for Six More Years
After the most contested and intense elections of the last decade, Venezuela will see six more years under the administration of Hugo Chávez Frías. Traffic on social networks, particularly on Twitter, was extremely intense, especially moments before the official announcement of the results.
Venezuela: Election Day Tweets and Hashtags
Twitter has been the most popular citizen media platform to discuss the presidential election of Sunday, October 7, 2012. Under different hashtags occupying the Trending Topic list in the country, Venezuelans comment, discuss, debate, report and share.
Venezuela: A Country in Suspense
The blog Tráfico Visual, dedicated to the expansion of the contemporary art movement in Venezuela, published the reflections of Roldán Esteva-Grillet in the text that accompanies the exhibition ‘Country in suspense’. Esteva-Grillet developed several ideas that seek to contribute to the political understanding of contemporary Venezuelan art.
Venezuela: Pictures of Election Day
Today, social networks in Venezuela show a country at the fringe. Along with testimonies, information, rumors and recommendations, citizen media platforms like Twitter, Facebook and Flickr have shared photos that portray a massive participation to elect the next President of the Republic.
Venezuela: Chávez Holds Huge Closing Campaign Rally in Caracas
President Hugo Chávez held a final campaign event in Caracas on October 4. Despite the rain, his followers filled major avenues in central Caracas, waving flags and cheering as they showed their support before election day on October 7. Many shared videos of the event on YouTube.
Venezuela: ‘Faces and Voices’ of an Election
Through a series of photographs and quotes, Portuguese photographer Eduardo Leal captures the thoughts and feelings of the Venezuelan people as they explain who they will vote for in the presidential election on Sunday, October 7.
Collaboration on Crowdsourced Mapping in Venezuela
A lot of people will be Tweeting, Facebook updating and texting about the presidential election in Venezuela this weekend -and many will be using social media to share reports of violence or misconduct. A few enterprising citizens have set up systems to catch and save these reports.
