Who asked them? And who audits that software? And what happens to Microsoft if some "bug" messes with the results? Hundred million dollar lawsuit by the party, I would hope, yes?<p>People should be outraged about this "Microsoft generosity". They're letting a private company put itself in the middle of the election process.<p>First off, election software should be open source. Period. If Microsoft is offering it "for free" anyway, why hasn't it made it open source? I mean, they are <i>so generous</i> and everything already!<p>Second, no private company should have access to that data or be able to influence that data in any way. If the party wants to offer the service online to see real-time results, then it should do that itself.<p>Third, the software should be audited by independent academic experts.<p>Anything less than these three points is an absolute outrage if you actually care about democracy.