Mechanical music, printers and voting machines

Hello MMD readers,  With the focus at this time on the State of
Florida, and on the subject of voting machines, I couldn't help but
draw a parallel between the variables in the Presidential election
tallies and what faces one in the sphere of mechanical music,
especially in my case, where 'punching the hole' has been the major
thrust for so many decades.

(In other words, listening to a player piano or interpreting the music
rolls is quite different from working with a musical idea, and then
perforating the actual holes which 'control' the piano, a process which
often requires a compromise between a performance possibility and the
limitations of the paper stock, the punch-and-die and a host of other
aspects.)

This evening, I couldn't believe what the former Secretary of State,
James Baker, said in the media, concerning irregularities with respect
to automatic mechanical counting machines.  Here's a sample URL in case
you wish to review the complete statement:
http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/11/11/baker_text/index.html

The controversy concerns whether to recount the Florida ballots "by
hand" -- looking at each one in the presence of two people, presumably
one from each political party -- versus "trusting mechanical 'reading'
machines".  In part, here's what Mr. Baker said in his public statement:

 "The manual vote count sought by the Gore campaign would not be more
  accurate than an automated count. Indeed, it would be less fair and
  less accurate. Human error, individual subjectivity, and decisions to
  'determine the voter's intent' would replace precision machinery in
  tabulating millions of small marks and fragile hole punches."

He also adds this ridiculous line: "Machines are neither Republicans
nor Democrats -- and therefore can be neither consciously nor
unconsciously biased."

Having deferred to mechanical over electronic machines for most of my
working life, especially in the printing/sorting/perforating fields,
I can categorically state that this "pro-machine" assessment is total
baloney!

The ballots in question can be likened to music rolls.  Could the holes
be a bit out-of-line?  Could the card sides be slightly tapered, so
some didn't fit properly in the stylus alignment slots?  Many of the
'reading' problems with the voting machines are probably not too far
away from mistracking player rolls.

For years I've had to watch the cross-bridges on my master rolls, since
the modified Acme perforators at Play-Rite can confuse one of these (on
an 'open' perforation) with a break in the music.  Thus, it's typical
for me to spend countless hours hand-tooling the cross-bridges with a
pen knife and/or a spring-loaded punch, just in case their tracker bar
and the pneumatic valves created a musical mistake.

(That's one of the reasons for the motorized editing table here in
Maine.  Each production run is matched to the master roll, which
travels back and forth to California with every duplicating session.)

We ran Gestetner multi-colour silk screen duplicators at The Musical
Wonder House for almost twenty years, and a pair of manually-operated
Master Addresser machines, which shuffled #10 envelopes along with
imprinting post cards.  I can state that the variables are myriad when
bristol or paper is being whisked through some automatic feeding
device.

Concerning rolls, I've had cases where a burr on a perfectly good
master roll, which played on my reference pianos in the studio, created
an adjacent note cluster when the copies arrived from Turlock.  That
led to my using sand paper on the back of the master, for certain kinds
of stock.

Humidity in Maine, as I suspect is present in Florida, also played
a major part in our printing and addressing operations.  Some paper
stocks would stick together, creating two blank pages with one
imprinted copy, or a similar effect with blank envelopes sandwiched
into stack, for the forthcoming mass mailing.  At each stage we had to
check everything manually and trust nothing to automation.  Our
automatic paper folders also had similar problems.

Finally, when one considers that the machines _require_ human
involvement, I'm surprised that Mr. Baker's statements aren't
questioned further.  You could see on television that the stacks
of so-called "butterfly ballots" were being tapped, jostled, pressed
together and then fed in as varying groups, which might affect the
spring pressure on the stack feeder.  All of these human operations
could play a major role in how the tally would come out.

The manner in which I put bristol and folded brochures into our
Gestetner #466, for example, could lead to a pile of perfect copies,
but most of the time you'd get a few bent sheets and each stack always
featured a few blanks, under the most ideal of circumstances.  It also
paid to examine which side of the stock was rougher, since that's
another factor in mechanical printing/sorting operations.  (The
secondary side was usually page 2 when published by The Musical Wonder
House, being printed on the premises!)

We've all been told in this electronic age that "the computer is down",
and many of us have had trouble with computerized billing practices,
on occasion.

However, while I have been involved with many aspects of mechanical
perforating, mechanical printing, mechanical feeding and other related
activities, I can say for a fact that pawls, belts, punches, gears,
mechanical fingers and other factors make mechanical operations of this
sort a gamble at any stage of the game.

(My Gestetner #466, for example, had a _pneumatic_ control which was
activated by a _mechanical_ finger to sense the moving paper.  A little
fuzz from the printing operation and this piston failed, producing
mangled or blank sheets within an otherwise good-looking stack of
copies.  The feeder mechanism used a hose which corresponded to what
one expects to find on an automatic sustaining pedal for a pneumatic
player action.)

Thus, when Mr. James Addison Baker III tells us that we can "trust
counting machines", I don't buy it.  Perhaps he grew up without an
Erector set, unlike me, or is just a dunce when it comes to mechanical
paper handling machinery.  As for me, I can see the mistracking effects
throwing off ballots here and there, and far more when the equipment is
running at full speed.

Let's face it, when you trust your automatic 'reproducing' player,
that's when the roll rips, since there was no human monitor near the
piano bench when disaster struck.  I even know of a case where a
Steinway Duo-Art grand was rewinding when the owner's 'phone rang,
while the pneumatic/mechanical devices kicked the electric motor into
the starting speed, almost causing a fire!

"Trust machines?"  Not me!  (Nothing beats working _with_ machines, but
that also introduces even more of the human element, much of the time.)

Maybe this is just hardball politics and Mr. Baker isn't the mechanical
'Zero' which his current statements make him out to be.  Maybe he needs
to operate one of these counting machines himself before putting out
any more misleading statements about the alleged efficiency of
mechanical machinery.

Regards from Maine,

Douglas Henderson - Artcraft Music Rolls
Wiscasset, Maine 04578
http://www.wiscasset.net/artcraft/