The Habs and Hab-nots of All-star Voting

Reminiscent of the Florida Central Voter File that spawned controversy surrounding the US presidential elections in 2000, and hockey scrub Rory Fitzpatrick finishing 3^rd among defensemen during a grass roots movement to get him into the 2007all star game. The NHL is looking into voting irregularities in this year's all-star voting process. It seems that some Canadiens hockey fans were not being honest. Really?

Apparently a scheme by Montreal Canadiens fans to flood the NHL All-Star Game ballot box with artificial votes was uncovered, in which a computer script augmented vote totals for Alexei Kovalev, Saku Koivu, Alex Tanguay, Andrei Markov, Mike Komisarek and Carey Price. Les Robots du Montreal.

The NHL is aware of the issue, and has taken some initial action by removing some of the artificial votes from Habtastic Five. But even after that action was taken, Canadians players are still the only players that are over 200,000 votes in the all-star balloting. Canadiens fans are defending the results by implicating that since this year marks the 100th anniversary of the Canadiens franchise combined with the all-star game being held in Montreal, there are more fans voting for Canadiens players. The Canadian Media is also down playing the entire incident. Who is running the voting, "ACORN"?

The NHL's conclusive solution to the problem was to install CAPTCHA technology to the voting process. This technology protects websites against bots by generating and grading tests that humans can pass but current computer programs cannot. This sort of technology is used everywhere from Myspace to online ticket ordering to prevent SPAM or fraud or any other unwanted intrusion from automated systems.

While it isn't unusual to see an overabundance of interest in the host team of an All-Star Game (particularly one in the hockey-mad city of Montreal), the degree to where the votes outpace any other team are 4:1. Unfortunately, in the age of the mighty Internet, cyber-weasels are bound and determined to ruin any possible enjoyment for the rest of us.

But lets not put all the blame on Canadiens fans and computer geeks. That wouldn't be right, or fun. Satan Bettman and his minions of greed and larceny have been bad for the NHL since his inception in 1993. While some may profess that Bettman has been the Savior of the NHL, most will disagree and one illustration of this, is that NHL marketing has sunk to broadcasting games on the hunting and fishing network. The latest in "real time" on-line voting is nothing more than a clandestine attempt to increase attention for the NHL and at the same time open up such types of espionage to the voter selection process.

So before you tell me to put on my tin foil helmet and preach NHL all-star voting conspiracy theories. Think about this. The NHL's approach to this years all-star ballot voting, has turned selecting all-star starters for an exhibition game into one of the most illicit publicity campaigns of the year. Ask yourself. When was the last time the NHL all-star game ever attracted so much attention? What size hat do you wear?