Quote Originally Posted by Natrix
Thanks all for your support and votes. I really appreciate it all!!

Yes, It appears that in the span of 5 hours or so yesterday, we went from 150 up to 500 down. CHEATERS!! The voting system is done on IP's. So yes, restarting your router and then getting a new IP will probably work. But not very quick. There are also proxy programs online that allow you to vote through another IP address. This might be what they used with multiple people at the same time voting.

My friend works at IBM and he says that it was very fishy and that it probably was an IP spoofer with a script running that made all those votes. Also they tried to script something to make it automatic and messed up the first time and it voted 39 times for the DO NO VOTE item. Now was it her or one of her supporters. I emailed the magazine, there marketing person told me that there was nothing wrong with their voting system and not to worry. Marketing, the only times they don't lie is when their mouth isn't moving. Don't really want her disqualified, just wish the system was more secure. Notice today, the votes didn't increase as much as they did last night. Cause the cheater didn't need to up the votes today since they were already winning.

Conclusion? Nothing really. I'm not going to stoop to their level and download programs that change my IP every minute and sit here for hours voting. It's unfortunate that this was that way, but the only thing that we can do to beat it is vote on Friday in mass quantities. If we got a little closer in the race and then just charged with 1000-2000 votes on Friday before the close. That might work. But probably not if they have that cheating system in effect. Thanks to everyone for promoting and helping out. It's much appreciated. I knew FTR would be the place to ask for help! Thanks everyone!!
Hi Nathan. We don't know each other, but I really liked your cover. What the marketing people told you was pure BS -- there is a well-known exploit for the voting plugin for WordPress that they're using. Also I like that you wouldn't want to win via cheating, but I felt like I should do something since it seemed pretty obvious your main competitor was using the exploit. Therefore, I have no choice but to win this poll myself. Best of luck for 2nd place!