The future is here now: Lotto-Boto

YOU read it right! The futuristic concept of elections using lotto-type system is now spreading virally throughout the country. It used to be just a mere bright idea decades ago when it was observed then that the popularly known online lottery of Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office could be applied as a conceptual framework in the automated national and local elections (NLE). Believe it or not, it is now a reality because of the emergence of the latest developments in hand-held technology called tablet.

In the early part of May 2015, Engineer Arnold Villasanta presented the lotto concept to Automated Election System (AES) Watch. I asked him, “How long can you come up with a working prototype?” He said, “One month using the matured and commercially off-the-shelf tablet technology.” But after two weeks, the father and son tandem of Arnold and Angelo presented to AES Watch the prototype.