In Democracy and Disaster, Indonesia and Emerging World Embrace ‘Open Data’ | The Jakarta Globe

" ... This worried Ainun Najib, an Indonesian IT consultant based in Singapore. 'I could see a situation where both sides claimed they’d won, based on their quick counts,' he said, adding he feared a quick descent into confrontation. 'I saw we’d need a third alternative.' Ainun reached out to two friends at Google, and between them they cobbled together a solution: a way to automatically download all the scanned files from the election website, and a website where volunteers could easily transcribe the key numbers from each tally into a spreadsheet. This marrying of open data, programming savvy and crowdsourcing was the key. Within a few days — well before the official result was available — 700 volunteers were able to tabulate more than 90 percent of the vote on a website that could be viewed by anyone. It was decisive in convincing Indonesians that the election had been fair — a verdict upheld by the country’s highest court last week ..."