Lab Report #24935 - Crime Control

Purpose: To find out how strictly city workers are punishing citizens for crimes.

Introduction: Recently it has seemed to me that the police have loosened up here in Whyville. I see a lot of people swearing and many petitions that contain foul language or bribes. I wanted to test the justice system for myself.

Hypothesis: If I create a petition in which I ask for passwords, either it will simply escape notice and die from lack of votes, or it will be reported and I will be taped for a couple of days.

Materials/Equipment: One testing account.

Procedure:
1) Create a testing account.
2) Log on to the testing account and go to City Hall.
3) Create a petition in which I ask for people to send me their passwords, "so I can give them a makeover."
4) Wait and see what happens.

Data/Results: Less than a day after I created the petition, when I tried to log on, it said "[Testing username] has been banished for Whyville due to inappropriate behavior."

Conclusion: My hypothesis was incorrect. My inappropriate petition was quickly discovered and I was banished instead of taped.

Discussion: I was very surprised at the outcome of this test. The result both pleased and disappointed me. First of all, I was happy to see how alert the city workers and citizens of Whyville are to bad petitions. It was encouraging to see how quickly my inappropriate petition was noticed. But I was also slightly upset at the seriousness of the punishment. Yes, I had asked for passwords, which is obviously a "felony" on Whyville. But I would have expected to be taped for this infraction. In cyranjoe's article, "Banishment: The Final Frontier", I feel he made it sound like banishment is only for people who repeatedly ask for passwords. So while I don't disagree with the punishment I was given, it surprised me.

I think the moral of this story is don't ask for passwords, even as a joke. You never know what may happen.

Following the rules,
JasmineK