fix mispelling in about screen

[selectricity-live] / app / views / about / anywhere.rhtml

<div id="title-header">
  <span class="header">Selectricity Anywhere</span>
  <span class="subheader"></span>
</div>

<p><em>Selectricity Anywhere</em> tries to help groups make better
decisions in their everyday lives. It tries to make voting technology
created for state elections and government use easily accessible for
every day decisions.</p>

<p><em>Selectricity Anywhere</em> is an email and SMS based interface to <a
href="http://rubyvote.rubyforge.org">RubyVote</a> a full-featured
election methods library with a focus on preferential decision-making.
It is similar to <a href="http://selectricity.media.mit.edu">Selectricity</a>,
a flexible web-based interface to the same voting machinery.</p>

<div class="normal-header">
  <span class="header">Usage</span>
  <span class="subheader"></span>
</div>

<p>You can use <em>Selectricity Anywhere</em> entirely by sending and
receiving emails or short text messages (SMS). In the US, most mobile
phones that cannot send email can send an text message or SMS to an
email address. <em>Selectricity Anywhere's</em> is designed to minimize the
amount of typing necessary to use the system while ensuring that answers
are small enough that they can fit in a mobile phone text message.</p>

<div class="warning">
<h4>Important Note</h4> <p>By default, all decisions are made with the
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schulze_method">
Schulze method</a> (Condorcet with Cloneproof Schwartz Sequential
Dropping), although the system can support other preferential and
non-preferential voting methods.</p>
</div>

<p>Please direct messages to: <strong><em><a href="mailto:vote@selectricity.org">vote@selectricity.org</a></em></strong></p>


<div class="normal-header">
  <span class="header">Creating a New Election</span>
  <span class="subheader"></span>
</div>

<p>To create a new election, send a message of the following form:</p>

<blockquote><tt>new <em>votename</em> <em>ABCD</em></tt></blockquote>

<p>Replace <tt><em>votename</em></tt> with an identifier for your vote.
All votes will need to be prefixed with this so pick something short and
easy to communicate to the other voters.</p>

<p>Replace <tt><em>ABCD</em></tt> with a list of letters, each of which
represents a choice in the election. If you are going choose lunch
between Chinese, Vietnamese, Mexican and Thai, a good string might be
<em><tt>CVMT</tt></em>. Capitalization is not necessary and does not
matter.</p>

<p>You will receive a confirmation message with information on how to
vote.</p>

<div class="warning">
<h4>Warning</h4>
<p>All votes will last only one hour. After one hour
from creating your vote, you will not be able to view the results or
vote in the election and your unique identifier will become available
for use in new votes.</p>
</div>


<div class="example">
<h4>Example Command</h4>
<p><tt>new lunch CVMT</tt></p>
</div>


<div class="normal-header">
  <span class="header">Voting</span>
  <span class="subheader"></span>
</div>

<p>To vote in an election, send a message of the following form:</p>

<blockquote><tt><em>votename</em> <em>ABCD</em></tt></blockquote>

<p>Replace <tt><em>votename</em></tt> with an identifier for the vote you
would like to vote in.

<p>Replace <tt><em>ABCD</em></tt> with a list of the the choices <em>in
the order that you prefer</em>. Please list all choices and do not
include any letters that are not choices. Send the choices as one "word"
-- do not separate them with spaces or punctuations. Capitalization is
not necessary and does not matter.</p>

<p>Each voter will receive a confirmation message for their vote after it
is recorded.</p>

<div class="example">
<h4>Example Command</h4> <p><tt>lunch TVMC</tt></p> <p>This would vote
express a preference of Thai over Vietnamese over Mexican over Chinese
in the election created in the example above.</p>
</div>

<div class="normal-header">
  <span class="header">View Results</span>
  <span class="subheader"></span>
</div>

<p>To view the results of an election, send a message of one of the
following forms:</p>

<blockquote>
  <tt>results <em>votename</em></tt><br />
  <em>.. or ..</em><br />
  <tt>res <em>votename</em></tt>
</blockquote>

<p>Replace <tt><em>votename</em></tt> with an identifier for the vote you
want results for.</p>

<p>The results will be computed and sent to the address that you sent
the message from .</p>

<div class="example">
<h4>Example Command</h4>
<p><tt>res lunch</tt></p>
</div>

<div class="normal-header">
  <span class="header">Information on a Vote</span>
  <span class="subheader"></span>
</div>

<p>To receive information on a vote, send a message of the following
form:</p>

<blockquote>
  <tt>info <em>votename</em></tt><br />
  <em>.. or ..</em><br />
  <tt><em>votename</em></tt>
</blockquote>

<p>Replace <tt><em>votename</em></tt> with an identifier for the vote you
want information on.</p>

<p>Information will be sent to the address that you sent the message
from.</p>

<div class="example">
<h4>Example Command</h4>
<p><tt>info lunch</tt></p>
</div>

<h2>General Help</h2>

<p>To receive help on using the system, send a message of the following
form:</p>

<blockquote>
  <tt>help</tt><br />
  <em>.. or ..</em><br />
  <tt>?</tt>
</blockquote>

<p>The system will respond with help information. However, the help is
designed to fit inside a 155 character text message and will be
<em>much</em> less extensive than the help on this page.</p>

<div class="normal-header">
  <span class="header">Advanced Usage</span>
  <span class="subheader"></span>
</div>

<p>There are two advanced types of usages that users of <em>Selectricity
Anywhere</em> might want to be aware of.</p>

<dt><strong>Candidate Descriptions</strong></dt>
<dd>
<p>During vote creation, users can provide longer descriptions for
candidates using a vote creation command of the following form:</p>

<blockquote>
  <tt>new <em>votename</em> <em>ABCD</em> <em>A:description B:description C:description D:description</em></tt>
</blockquote>

<p>The first three arguments are from the standard vote creation. The
second include a series of one-word descriptions which are prefixed by
the vote character and a <tt>:</tt>.</p>

<p>Voters can see the voting list by sending a message containing
<tt>info <em>votename</em></tt> or <tt><em>votename</em></tt> as
described in the section on getting <em>Information on a Vote</em>.</p>

<div class="example">
<h4>Example Command</h4>
<p><tt>new lunch CVMT c:chinese v:vietnamese m:mexican t:thai</tt></p>
</div>

<p>During vote creation, users can specify a voting method other than
the default (Condorcet with cloneproof Schwartz sequential dropping).

<p>They do so using a vote creation command of the following form:</p>

<blockquote>
  <tt>new <em>votename</em> <em>ABCD</em> method<em>:methodname</em></tt>
</blockquote>

<p>The first three arguments are from the standard vote creation.
<tt><em>methodname</em></tt> must be the name of a voting method that is
supported. Possible methods include:</p>

<ul>
<li><tt>plurality</tt>: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plurality_electoral_system">Plurality Voting</a></li>
<li><tt>approval</tt>: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting">Approval voting</a></li>
<li><tt>condorcet</tt>: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condorcet_method">Condorcet voting</a></li>
<li><tt>ssd</tt>: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schulze_method">Schulze method</a> (Condorcet voting with cloneproof Schwartz sequential
dropping) <em>(default)</em></li>
<li><tt>borda</tt>: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borda_count">Borda count</a></li>
<li><tt>runoff</tt>: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_Runoff_Voting">Instant runoff voting</a> (IRV)</li>
</ul>

<div class="warning">
<h4>Note</h4>
<p>If you have selected approval or plurality voting, you
do not need to include a list of each candidate with each vote.</p>
</div>


<p>Voters can see the voting list by sending a message containing
<tt>info <em>votename</em></tt> or <tt><em>votename</em></tt> as
described in the section on getting <em>Information on a Vote</em>.</p>

<div class="example">
<h4>Example Command</h4>
<p><tt>new lunch CVMT method:approval</tt></p>
</div>