27 Feb 2007 at 15:39 - 4
In reality, the test is a hack of Canada's legal code by the promotions business. Canadian anti-gambling law makes it illegal to sell chances to win a prize, so promoters always offer a free method of entering each contest, and task every winner with a skill-testing question. By doing the latter, they argue, the game is no longer one merely of chance but a contest requiring some skill.
In decades past, the tests of skill were designed to be interesting. Challenges approved by the courts include estimating the number of beans in a jar and calculating the time it takes for a barrel to float downriver. Not all tests have received a legal passing grade, however. Canadian courts have shot down skill tests consisting of shooting a turkey at 50 yards, or quickly peeling a potato, on the grounds that they're too easy.
But a 1984 court case validated a simple, four-part mathematical question as a test of skill. The test? Multiply 228 by 21; add to that 10,824; divide the answer by 12; and subtract 1,121. For each promotion something similiar is drawn up and presented to the winner.
The Canadian court's stamp of approval paired with the simple nature of the question has made the four-part mathematics problem the de facto standard among product promotion sweepstakes.
And to think..........I'm not even Canadian, eh!