[V]ote-auction was a website which offered US citizens the chance to sell their presidential vote to the highest bidder during the presidential elections of 2000, Al Gore vs. G.W. Bush. Several US States (Missouri, Wisconsin, Chicago, Arizona, Nevada, California, Massachusetts, New York) issued temporary restraining orders or injunctions for alleged illegal vote trading. This led to the shutdown of 2 domains (voteauction.com and vote-auction.com). Federal Attorney Janet Reno, the FBI and the NSA were investigating the case to ensure the integrity of the voting process on November 7th, 2000.

Over 1800 global and national news features in online media, print, television and radio have been reported (including a 27-minute CNN exclusive “Burden of Proof”).

[V]ote-Auction is one of most risky and paradoxically successful projects by UBERMORGEN.COM: it is “the only platform in the world that provides the end-consumer an effective role in the American election industry”. A true interchange system that finally “brings capitalism and democracy closer together”.

Carrying on with their principles of radical corporative marketing strategy (media hacking), the artists group UBERMORGEN.COM has produced an effective and credible interface which helps create a personal, documented cease-and-desist request which is also automatically sent to the DNS administrators, to the site’s owner and to some journalists to trick them into supporting the “public trial”.

The website was conceived by the student James Baumgartner and then sold to the Austrian business-artists Hans Bernhard (founder of etoy) and Lizvlx from UBERMORGEN.COM in Austria and [V]ote-auction Inc. in Sofia/Bulgaria (a subsidiary of the UBERMORGEN.COM group) for an undisclosed sum. [V]ote-auction was UBERMORGEN. COM’s featured media hacking performance in the year 2000.

UBERMORGEN.COM exhibited the [V]ote-auction CNN tape, Vote-auction-Seals and original legal Documents in the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum 2001, The Premises Gallery in Johannesburg 2002, Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona 2003, Read_me 2.4 in Helsinki 2003, Konsthall Malmoe 2004, Kunsthaus Graz 2004, Lentos Museum of Modern Art 2005.


Links: www.vote-auction.net

LIZVLX (AT), born 1973, holds an MBA in market research and advertisement from the University of Economics in Vienna / Austria. She is the founder of 194.152.164.137 and of UBERMORGEN.COM. Projects include [V]ote-auction, NAZI~LINE, *THE*AGENCY*, bmdi.de, ipnic.org / injunction generator, etxtreme.ru, bannster.net, the white website, bartnlisa, esof ltd, AnuScan, sleeping baby—playing baby, Webpaintings vs. Pixelpaintings.

Hans Bernhard (AT), born 1973, is founder of etoy.com & UBERMORGEN.COM. He holds an MFA in visual media from the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, Prof. Peter Weibel. He was awarded the Golden Nica at the Prix Ars Electronica. Hans Bernhard is also an expert on the Runme.org board.

UBERMORGEN.COM is an artist duo that was founded in Vienna, Austria in 1999 by Hans Bernhard (founder of etoy) and lizvlx. UBERMORGEN.COM is one of the most uncatchable identities —controversial and iconoclast— of the contemporary European techno-fineart avantgarde. ubermorgen is a German word for “the day after tomorrow” or “super-tomorrow”.