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So after speaking with the director of the event, we have received this official response about the results of the online poll:
"Wednesday night, it was noted by several ... directors and a number of students who called into our office that the band's [Random Access] numbers were jumping in a fashion that suggested that computer programming might have been used to automatically vote for the band. After investigating into the situation both through our voting tracking and by speaking with Random Access, we have determined that all votes were legally placed on the website, and therefore Random Access is the winner of the online poll."
So they had automatically assumed that we cheated, isn't that great? Well thanks to you guys we won that vote fair and square!
If we win this next round we will be playing at the 2007 University of Maryland's ART ATTACK. I'll keep you updated
Previous thread- http://forums.macresource.com/read/1/277241
Original posting- http://forums.macresource.com/read/1/276639
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Congrats, and glad they didn't discount our votes!
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...tomorrow the world!!
Well done and good luck with the next.
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Umm, you did cheat. you had people on an online forum who have nothing to do with the event or the school vote for you.
You're a modern day Shalimar, umm, I mean Shimalimma, that kid on American Idol, what's his/her name? Sanjaya– that's it!
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Someday someone will Google "Random Access" and discover the truth as documented here. Enjoy the 15 seconds of fame before the scandal begins!
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So stuffing the ballot box is legal, as long as a computer program didn't do it, huh?
A while back the State of Washington had an online poll set up. I think it might have been to vote on a design for the State quarter, although it seems like it was more recent than that. Whatever it was, they discovered the "winner" had been chosen in about the same way as Random Access won this contest. The stakes were bigger, so they tossed out the whole thing and set up a more secure voting system.
What surprised me about this vote was that their system did detect that something strange was going on when I was casting multiple votes. I got a pop up that said my access would be blocked, but yet I was able to get back on in a few minutes and vote again.
And, Markintosh, if the word combo is correct, the Macresource thread already pops up first in a Google search. Whatever methods those directors use to examine the results of polls like this should be expanded to include Google searches. It only took me two tries to get the Google results, by the way.
I do hope they don't snatch the victory away from you, although, on the other hand, maybe that is what should happen. Yes, I did participate, but I also learned my lesson; I'm a lowdown cheat and should know better. 
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Now really, you guys are getting a little paranoid I think.
The program director told all the bands "now is your chance to get all your online friends to vote for your band". I consider all of you to be my online friends so I asked you to vote for my band, and you did, and it was good. The whole point was to get as many people as you knew to vote for your band. This is not cheating. I even gave you all a link to listen to the music before you voted in case you didn't like it and didn't feel it worthy of a vote.
I really don't see what the problem is...
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Regardless of whether or not it is cheating, it seems like a dumb way to choose the best band doesn't it?
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[quote mikebw]Now really, you guys are getting a little paranoid I think.
The program director told all the bands "now is your chance to get all your online friends to vote for your band". I consider all of you to be my online friends so I asked you to vote for my band, and you did, and it was good. The whole point was to get as many people as you knew to vote for your band. This is not cheating. I even gave you all a link to listen to the music before you voted in case you didn't like it and didn't feel it worthy of a vote.
I really don't see what the problem is...
Oh, well in that case they just have to be a little more explicit about how "your online friends" is defined. In that regard, you didn't cheat.
That still doesn't excuse my behavior, since I did vote more than once, just to see if I could get away with it. That part is MY problem, not yours.
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It is most certainly not a good way to choose a band who could potentially play at the final event. In my experience, some of the most 'popular' bands are far from the 'best' bands. Of course that might make me seem hypocritical as we had the most votes, but I think you know what I mean.
I wouldn't feel bad about multiple votes either as every band had the same means to gather votes, and if that meant clicking until your fingers bled then so be it. As it was they claimed to be able to discern the number of unique IP address as votes, but who knows. Any fault of the polls' implementation is not my own. I appreciate your honesty though.
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