Of course it's pretty hard to criticise them for seeking to gauge the opinions of other local Net users and last night I went and exercised my obligation to participate in the vote.

On my first attempt -- access to the site at was down. A traceroute showing that there was no life after the 13th hop on the way to election.com.

Then I received an email from an Aardvark reader who described the problems that they'd encountered while attempting to cast their vote -- "ERROR1 ... ETM_User.User_Methods returned an error"

After about 15 minutes the election.com site came back to life and I went in to cast my vote but found the design of the voting process to be atrocious!

Look at this screen -- it says "You have voted in favour/against this application as follows...".

So -- my vote has been counted right?

Err.. well, maybe not -- after all, there's also a "Vote" button on that page. Does this mean I get another vote? Does it mean I have to vote twice -- after all, I've just been told further up the page that "You have voted..."

Clicking on the "Vote" button produces this screen which indicates to me that my vote hadn't actually been counted before. I wonder how many people got to that previous screen, read that they had voted and then went straight off to some other site without performing the second stage?

Is it just me or is this a badly designed system that makes what should be a very simple process confusing (come on, you can be honest -- tell me.)

Readers Say (updated hourly) Radio New Zealand site... - Simon job community... - digitaldunk Voting... - Tim Have Your Say

Making Money, Part 1
In the wake of my recent contemplation of how small online publishers can spin a dollar for their efforts, I've added a new feature to the Aardvark site today.

It's The Employment Centre, a service which I hope will serve to connect IT employers with IT workers.

Phase one of this service is in place and allows employers and employment agencies to list positions -- free of charge until April 1. Shortly I'll be adding the ability for workers to list their skillsets and availability, a service that will remain free for the foreseeable future.

Given that Aardvark reaches a significant percentage of those in the NZ IT Industry I'm hoping that the service will be well patronised by those looking for workers and those looking for jobs.

The fees that employers and agencies will pay for listing their jobs in this part of the site as of next month will remain very modest -- far less than those charged by competing sites -- despite the highly targeted audience.

Suggestions, critiques and comments are all welcomed.

As always, your feedback is welcomed.

Did you tell someone else about Aardvark today? If not then do it now!