Law and Order Badge

Punishments:
Breaking the Rules and Regulations of HE is not something to be taken lightly. All requests made by the staff regarding the treatment of others and proper behavior are not difficult, nor are they asking for a lot. Due to the simplicity of following the rules designated by HE, punishments should be used against members who fail to follow the rules. They are as follows:

1) Warnings from Staff

It’s possible that some members are unaware of certain rules on HE. Not all members think to look around for threads regarding rules, especially if they’ve been members of other forums beforehand and believe that all forums have the same general rules and expectations. Therefore, I think an initial warning from a Prefect, Head of House, Professor, Administrator or even another concerned member is a good first step to ensure the user is aware of the rule.

For example, some members may be used to mainly adult communities and could be unaware that things such as language and topic content may be monitored. If they were to use profanities or talk about adult content and a young member was to see it, they may be too nervous or uncomfortable to report it to a staff member. This means it falls to other members and staff to be on the watch for such problems to make sure every user on the site acknowledges the possibility of younger members. The warning does not need to be long, nor does it even need to be strict or unfriendly sounding. A simple friendly reminder or a point towards the Rules and Regulations thread is sufficient to keep all members aware.

If, however, a member has already been warned about a rule they have broken, and they continue to ignore these polite reminders, a stricter warning may be necessary. This would fall to the administrators to send a private message to the user in question explaining once again why they cannot break whichever rule is the problem and further punishments that may occur if they continue. This gives the user a one-on-one warning from an administrator that would be impossible for them to ignore because they have been singled out and reprimanded.

2) Remove Specific Earned Housepoints

After the user has been warned by an administrator and is still breaking rules, a direct punishment is an order. The removal of housepoints they have earned would be a harsh, but hopefully effective, measure to take. There are several reasons why this could prove to be a good reminder to stop the user from breaking the rules.

First, any housepoints they have earned would have been done so through hard work and determination to earn as many house points as they can. Taking away housepoints is not only exactly what would happen in the Harry Potter novels, but is also taking away from their achievements. What the administration can hope for is that the user will be indignant at losing their hard own points and work harder to remember in the future that breaking rules will earn punishments.

The second reason why taking away housepoints would be effective is that it would not only be taking away from the member, but from the whole house. This should cause the member to feel bad about taking points away from their hardworking house in the attempt to win the House Cup. Other members would not be happy with the news that their housepoints have been lowered due to a members inability to follow the rules and would either cause the member breaking the rules to be more observant in following them, or allow other members of the house to keep a closer eye on reminding said user to adhere to the rules.

3) Points Added to Warning Bar

If taking away housepoints was still not effective in stopping this user’s habits, adding points to the warning bar for their offensives would be the next step. One point could be added to the warning bar for each misdemeanor that occurs as well as taking away housepoints.

Because there are only three warning points, it will become quite obvious to the user when they receive a point as the bar will fill one third of the way. This should immediately draw their attention to the fact that they are still breaking rules if they are doing unintentionally as a habit and the fact that the bar is always there to remind them in their posts should act as a constant reminder that they need to be more careful when posting.

Besides their own ability to see the warning bar, it is displayed for all members to see in every post they make. This may cause embarrassment for said member which causes them to be extra careful while posting. Even if it does not, the continued addition of adding warning points to the bar and removal of housepoints allows other members to be aware of the problem so they can become more watchful of it as well. Hopefully reminders from friends may keep the rule breaking at bay.

4) Suspension or Banning

If all of the following punishments fail to stop the users rule breakings, it would seem they are uninterested in upholding the views and values of HE and should therefore no longer be able to call themselves a member.

If the rule breaking doesn’t seem often enough to call for a full out banning, suspension from the site for a specific amount of time does not seem like a bad idea. The users will not be able to log into their account for the designated time decided on by the administrators and the user will be notified for the reason why. Hopefully, by the time the suspension has ended, the user will be more willing to follow the regulations or will have realized that HE may not be the place for them.

However, if the rule breaking has been consistent and the member unapologetic, that user should be banned from the site. The user obviously has no interest in the comfort of other members and may not even be in active member in events or challenges. Banning the user completely would be an effective way of stopping the rule breaking. If the administrators are concerned that the member may register under another username, it is possible for them to block the users IP address to be sure the member cannot disrupt the site anymore.

The above punishments seem reasonable, though hopefully they would never need to go beyond simple warnings to the member.

Internet Laws:
Employee E-mail Communications and Internet Access

National Conference of State Legislature wrote:

-Employers who engage in any type of electronic monitoring must give prior written notice to all employees, informing them of the types of monitoring which may occur.
-If an employer has reasonable grounds to believe that employees are engaged in illegal conduct and electronic monitoring may produce evidence of this misconduct, the employer may conduct monitoring without giving prior written notice.

These points are taken directly from the state of Connecticut’s legislature regarding the monitoring of e-mails by bosses of employees. In this specific law, it is made very clear as to when emails can be monitored and when they cannot. If any employers wish to monitor the emails of their employees for possible behavior issues, they must first give out warning to all employees regarding exactly what type of monitoring they will be performing. This means that employers cannot just decide one day that they want to make sure none of their members are up to no good and start flipping through e-mails. Fair warning must first be given before they are allowed access to their employees’ e-mails.

However, the second point in the bill states that if the employer has sufficient reason to believe that an employee is engaged in any activities that are illegal, they do not need to disclose any notice about the possible monitoring. This part of the bill makes complete since. If someone was warned in advance about the possibility of monitoring, they would stop immediately from their work account to be sure they weren’t caught. Without warning, they can be easily caught. The employer must first be sure they have actual evidence that the worker is doing something illegal therefore protecting the rights of the people.

Privacy Policies for Web Sites:

National Conference of State Legislature wrote:

Requires any person who collects Social Security numbers in the course of business to create a privacy protection policy. The policy must be "publicly displayed" by posting on a web page and the policy must (1) protect the confidentiality of Social Security numbers, (2) prohibit unlawful disclosure of Social Security numbers, and (3) limit access to Social Security numbers.

This legislative protection in Connecticut is very important for citizens. Social Security numbers tell exactly who a person is and the theft of this number could lead to identity theft or even allow an online predator knowledge as to who exactly you are. Under this law, any website that is going to collect Social Security numbers for any reason must do a series of things to protect the safety of users. First, the policy must include the following: keep all Social Security numbers private, it’s illegal to disclose any of the numbers, and there is limited access to any numbers submitted. All of these points must be displayed on the webpage in which they are submitting their Social Security number so all users are aware of exactly how they will be protected.

Privacy of Personal Information
This last law states that online services must keep any information regarding member’s private from the public without first getting the permission of said member to disclose the information. This means that even information regarding surfing habits or sites they’ve visited, possibly for research or demographics, must first be disclosed by official consent from the user. Some sites will have a user check a box before submitting information that asks if they are willing to disclose any information or not to keep the distribution of information simple.

HE Special Law Enforcement
Name:HE Aurors

Logo:


Uniform:


Five Members I Would Choose:
Slytherin: violetriddle and Raistlin The Wizard

Gryffindor: FaerieOfDoom

Ravenclaw: stephy and Sashi

I would choose these members because they are all incredibly dedicated to HE and each of them knows the Rules and Regulations of HE well and follows them carefully. Each of them is also very actice around the site and would therefore be able to keep all forums monitored for potential rule breaking. Not to mention they would all look awesome in their uniforms.

[[Sorry for this Rai. It's loooooooooooong. ]]