Has Fan Voting for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Been Hacked Again?
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame pays lip service to fans when it comes to voting who should make it into the Hall. (The real decisions are made by the Hall’s insiders, but they gotta do this for appearances, you know?) Last year, though, there was a problem: someone hacked into the system which saw the top five nominees receive an insane number of votes. That’s how Chicago finished on top. Allegedly.
The Hall said that all these problems were fixed and that this year’s fan voting would be totally legit. And for the first month, things were fine. But then…
ICYMI, the @Rock_Hall released over 500,000 held votes and dramatically shifted the fan poll results, but maintain poll integrity is intact. pic.twitter.com/bo9dFm9slb
— Future Rock Legends (@futurerocklgnds) November 28, 2016
In case you can’t make it out, that’s Journey in first place followed by ELO, Yes and Pearl Jam. The spikes were caused by the Hall releasing 500,000 votes. Cleveland.com explains what happened.
[T]he Rock Hall insists that the increase in votes is a result of votes being held back to prevent voter fraud. All current totals are indeed accurate, the Rock Hall says.
“There was a purposeful delay in releasing votes to the overall standings, but it was precisely so we could protect the vote from being hacked,” says Todd Mesek, Vice President of Marketing and Communications for the Rock Hall. “The votes that were released yesterday were being held to make sure we could validate their authenticity.”
Mesek continued: “The ballots were determined to be legitimate and there was no over-voting. We made the decision to release these votes to the public website at one time. This is not unlike a typical political election where there are many votes that require additional validation before they are cast and the election is certified.”
Okay, we’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. But if you’re horrified at the prospect of Journey being inducted ahead of Kraftwerk, then pray that things turn around before voting ends on December 15.
