Letter: Census should have kept Internet option on the table
A reader says that if the bureau had pursued a Web-based response system for the 2010 census, the decision to abandon handheld devices wouldn’t be so disappointing.
Regarding “Census counts on paper for 2010”: Yes, scrapping the handhelds for enumeration in 2010 is a fiasco but probably a necessary one at this point, given the reported lack of progress.
However, the real fiasco was the decision two years ago to scrap an Internet option for this census. That technology would have provided a very cost-effective way to gather citizen response data quickly and with high accuracy, as proven many times over by numerous other industrialized countries.
If plans for this response option were in place now, the failure of the handhelds would not be so very poignant.
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