
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
September 16, 2000


New Austrian owner of Voteauction.com adds exciting features

Contact: 
Hans Bernhard (mailto:hans@ubermorgen.com, +43-676-930 0061)
James Baumgartner (mailto:baumgj@rpi.edu, +1-518-506 7725)


Voteauction.com, the first web site to cut out the middleman 
and bring campaign contributions directly to the voters, is re-
launching with several new features designed to better serve 
the voting public.

The site was first launched on August 1 with a plan to allow 
voters to sell their votes to the highest bidder. When the 
New York City Election Commission threatened to crack down on
voteauction.com, the site's founder, James Baumgartner, shut 
down the site and began looking for a way to operate 
voteauction.com legally. But even while the site was shut down, 
it was receiving wide attention on television, in print and on 
the Internet (see partial press list below.)

News about the site attracted the attention of Hans Bernhard, 
an Austrian businessman whose holdings include a number of 
small dot-com enterprises.  Bernhard, an e-commerce innovator 
whose meteoric business success combines an ability to marry 
emergent technologies with social needs, offered to purchase 
the site and run it overseas, where it would not be subject 
to U.S. Election Laws.

"As America continues to expand the role of private enterprise 
in key areas once inaccessible to private investors, new 
opportunities constantly arise. At this point in time, the 
election industry is uniquely attractive to the foreign 
investor," Bernhard said. "I believe that voteauction.com, as a 
pioneer in this market, will be a great complement to other 
emerging American investment opportunities, for example in the 
Corrections and Education industry."

Bernhard's team has implemented several exciting new features 
for the voteauction.com re-launch.

* Voter Empowerment Kits: Users will be able to download 
flyers, handbills, and bumper-sticker ready artwork for their 
own uses. The voters can then market their votes directly to 
campaign contributors.  This way, the voter can cash in on the
capital potential of all their votes, not just their 
Presidential vote.

* Voteauction.com message board:  This public forum will allow
voteauction.com users to post their feedback on the 
voteauction.com product.

* Voteauction Action Team: The Voteauction Action Team will 
travel around America handing out Voter Empowerment Kits and 
educating voters on how they can cash in on their democratic 
capital.

Voteauction.com already has over 6000 registered users. With 
its new features and under new ownership, voteauction.com will 
continue to be a leader in the growing election industry.  As 
owner Hans Bernhard says, "Voteauction.com represents a new 
paradigm in the election industry, providing a win-win situation 
for both the voter and the investor."


Selected Press

Washington Post:
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14820-2000Aug24.html

CNN.com:
http://www.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/08/24/internet.vote/index.html

Wired News: 
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,38559,00.html

ABC News:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/DailyNews/cashvotes000818.html

NY1 News:
http://www.ny1.com/ny/Living/SubTopic/index.html?topicintid=4&subtopicintid=101&contentintid=7408


Selected Quotes

"These people are 50 years ahead of their time in seeing the 
ultimate destination of the current [electoral] process."
Jamin Raskin, law professor at American University  (Wired News)

"When I saw that I would have to choose between Bush and Gore 
this year, I felt like staying home on election day. Knowing that 
the candidates had raised hundreds of millions of dollars for 
this election, I realized that my vote is worth a lot of money.  
There are millions of people like me, and voteauction.com will 
help us earn money from our voting power."
James Baumgartner, Voteauction.com founder (previous press release)

"This website is an INSULT to every American who has ever fought 
to protect our freedom or for the right to vote in America!"
Barbara Phillips, chairman of the Voting Integrity Project
(voting-integrity.org)
