Mount Albert by-election

Written By: - Date published: 6:02 pm, June 12th, 2009 - 26 comments
Categories: mt albert - Tags:

Today all of the hoardings in Mount Albert go down. Tommorrow the many volunteers from all major and few minor parties will assemble to help get voters to go to the polling booths.

For people in Mount Albert who are unsure if they can vote in that electorate because you just moved there. You can. Just go to the polling booth and have a special vote. The polling clerks will sort it out after the day.

All of the Labour volunteers, who are whom I’m interested in, know where they have to go. If in doubt read your e-mail backlog. We need everyone to turn out and do their part.

Despite what the polls say, mid-winter elections for Labour depend on making sure that everyone who can vote does vote. To do that we need a lot of people to help remind people that there is a by-election on Saturday. Hard as it may be to believe, there are still people who won’t know that it is Saturday. Despite how crap the weather is likely to be is they should get to a polling booth to select their new MP to replace Helen Clark. The systems are all in place and everything you do will be effective.

Lets see if it is possible to get a higher turnout in  a by-election than it is in a general election.

In the meantime there will be a silence about the political aspects of the by-election in Mount Albert on this blog site until after the polls close at about 7pm. This will be enforced by auto-moderation and a strict banning policy.

26 comments on “Mount Albert by-election ”

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  1. Anita 1
    12 June 2009 at 8:08 pm

    there will be a silence about the political aspects of the by-election in Mount Albert on this blog site until after the polls close at about 7pm

    That’s your choice not a legal requirement eh? Or are the rules for by-elections different?

    • lprent 1.1
      12 June 2009 at 8:45 pm

      If the site was in NZ, then it would probably be a legal requirement from midnight. Since it isn’t then almost probably not.

      But the rule makes sense electorally. The reason that it is on now is so I can test it while I still have time to play around.

  2. Rochelle Rees 2
    12 June 2009 at 8:52 pm

    It’s on an NZ domain name, and as such if you breach the laws I imagine Internet NZ would have a good case to take the domain name away.

    Also, since you live in NZ and are open about running the site, potentially you could be charged.

    Those are my guesses on the law, but to be honest I’m Clueless.

    • felix 2.1
      12 June 2009 at 9:03 pm

      Sick burn.

    • lprent 2.2
      12 June 2009 at 11:04 pm

      On the other hand, the domain could become nzstandard.org pretty fast. They’d have to argue that if I didn’t write the material that I was a publisher and I publish offshore. It’d be hard for them to prove that I actually own more than the domain name.

      Frankly the net is making some of the legalities more than a little moot at present.

      • Rochelle Rees 2.2.1
        12 June 2009 at 11:47 pm

        True, but how many people would actually know the new domain name? I’m sure all the regulars would figure it out… Maybe you should switch over occasionally and test that theory 😉

        • lprent 2.2.1.1
          13 June 2009 at 1:06 am

          Becomes an legal interesting question if the URL just initiates the new URL… ie gives a (ummm) 304 or the like. Is the road sign responsible for the town it points to? (strains for an analogy).

          That is the easiest way to turn it over. It accepts from either address but uses one as the main. http://thestandard.org.nz already does this. It points to a different URL on the same domain http://www.thestandard.org.nz. The trick is minimal to do it with a different domain name. Hell I could probably do it simplistically with .htaccess

          • Rochelle Rees 2.2.1.1.1
            13 June 2009 at 1:51 am

            Of course, which is why my point was that you should test the theory by removing thestandard.org.nz completely for a day or so, and only use the other domain name. See how much your stats drop 😉 If Internet NZ decides to take down your domain name, I doubt they will be kind enough to redirect it to the new one for you (with a .htaccess file (BTW great that you have converted to the dark side, even if the windows version of .htaccess you wrote was kind of cool!), a 304 error (or more accurately a 301 error), a meta refresh tag, a client side or server side redirect, or any other method you can dream up)!

            Perhaps some marketing strategies for ensuring all readers of The Standard know both domain names are in order?

            Call it preparing for a worst case scenario. Imagine ACT one day become a majority government, and we all suddenly find out how much the left right line is really a circle? (Actually I’m wondering where the UK could be headed right now :-/)

    • Rochelle Rees 3.1
      13 June 2009 at 2:03 am

      Yep. Got temporarily google-washed when the media covered it. Nice to see it back 🙂 Of course, others could always help me ensure it stays there!

      • jarbury 3.1.1
        13 June 2009 at 11:25 am

        Google is kind of self-reinforcing right? So if we keep clicking on his site as the current first response to “Clueless” then it should maintain it for a while yet.

        Links also help too I imagine 🙂

        (one problem is that each time I visit his site I have to see that smarmy face of his.)

  4. Francois 4
    12 June 2009 at 9:14 pm

    The Labour Party Machine (TM) and Young Labour have pretty much ensured a Labour victory.

    • gingercrush 4.1
      12 June 2009 at 10:12 pm

      They have? I would have thought Lee foot-in-mouth disease has done the trick. I really wanted to see how strong the Labour machine was in Mt. Albert. Unfortunately, with the mess that was Lee its going to be difficult to judge that organisation.

      I guess turn-out will be key. I think many National supporters though have decided to stay at home. Though we’ll see tomorrow.

      • lprent 4.1.1
        12 June 2009 at 10:59 pm

        Suffice it to say that it is pretty damn strong. Of course for a by-election it has been beefed up a *lot*. Both in canvassing and e-day people. So the targeting and contacts with the targets will be higher than usual.

        Of course you could always volunteer to help on the Nat side and see what it is like from the other side.

  5. mickysavage 5
    12 June 2009 at 9:18 pm

    Do not forget the outstanding contributions by Melissa Lee, John Key and Richard Worth although the machine and Young Labour/Princes Street’s contributions have been extraordinary.

    BUT the voters have to vote tomorrow …

  6. Pat 6
    12 June 2009 at 11:11 pm

    I’d just like to say that I think ……. has run an excellent campaign and I fully expect …… to win.

    (enter comment into filter, press go, wait 30 seconds)

  7. calltoaccount 7
    13 June 2009 at 8:24 am

    Hi Lynn, sounds like you are all good and busy! Hope to see you on the day…

  8. Rich 8
    13 June 2009 at 2:36 pm

    What happens to all the advocacy that’s already on your site, and every other site?

    Do you “publish, distribute or broadcast” when you first release the content, or each time it gets viewed?

    • Anita 8.1
      13 June 2009 at 2:47 pm

      What you’re looking for is s197(2A) of the Electoral Act. As long as the material was on the website before midnight and accessing the website is voluntary (no pop-ups on other sites, for example) and the website is not itself advertised on election day it’s fine to leave material up.

  9. victoria 9
    15 June 2009 at 3:26 pm

    thanks
    i your most favourite fan.