New Zealand Police Act Wiki Lets You Write the Law

PhoenixOr writes "New Zealand is now on the top of my list for cool governments. They've opened a wiki allowing the populace to craft a new version of their Police Act, the legislative basis for policing in New Zealand."

Comments

kiwis use wikis

[Strange Ranger]

Film at 11.

Cool government indeed.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Anonymous Coward]

I live here, nothing cool about our government.

The police initiative to use a wiki to collect feedback on the up coming Police Act 2008 is a useful tool

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Tuoqui]

Now if only this would catch on... we might actually see laws that are representative of what the people want instead of some asshole with a few hundred thousand dollars more than they should have in their pocket.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[kongit]

I whole heartedly endorse this idea. I am an Interweb abuser and I know that what I feel is correct in governing people is correct. Arise ye vast horde of Interweb users and smite down those poor and stupid who cannot fathom the power of the Interweb. Let Darwin rule the day as we the advanced people of the Interweb shout out our chorus in the form of a Wiki. We are the intelligent feel our wrath oh feeble minded fools who farm and stuff and dont have DSL or cable and cannot load the Wikis of the Interweb. LONG LIVE THE WIKI KIWIS OF WIKILAND!


Note: this product is not sanctioned by the United States Department of Homeland Security.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Virtual_Raider]

I don't think we would see to many of those laws. The final draft will be reviewed by a relevant body before submitting it for approval. Not doing so would be insane, as all manner of abuse could find their way into the law otherwise. The thing is, it will be reviewed by those same people that we are supposing take "financial aids" from interest groups. So they will just snip out whatever doesn't suit their agendas.

I know this is a police law, but think of the possibilities in other areas. What if I want to expand the definition of Fair Use? Or if I want to shorten copyright duration? Do you see those amends surviving even on the face of overwhelming public support on the wiki? On top of lobbyists there would be astroturfers for one thing. And let's not forget that usually the only people that are vocal about something are those with a vested interest. I wouldn't want the nosy bastards from some retarded Home-Owners association slipping in some ordinances that would, for example, prevent me from installing a solar array on my backyard because it "ruins the aesthetics of the neighborhood" or such. Particularly if I don't even live on their area but get covered by this laws.

I think is a good publicity stunt and it may even generate some novel ideas, but I just don't see it suddenly making sense of the legal landscape in any meaningful way. I'd much rather they put the existing laws in a database with strong referential integrity. That would be interesting.

Just some ramble =)

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Petrushka]

I live here, nothing cool about our government.

Hmm ... loathing of government for no stated reason ... high probability of right-wing lean ... posting as AC ... do I detect a denizen of nz.general?

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Petrushka]

Not so fast. They've set the wiki up with a rather short-sighted password policy: any editor can set a password on any page that can protect that page from being edited or even being seen by anyone else. I'm having difficulty finding any pages that don't have passwords set ...

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Anonymous Coward]

State-sponsored freedom strikes again!

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Opportunist]

And that's why it won't fly. I mean, could you explain to me the business model?

1. Refuse big bucks from companies to make laws for them.
2. ???
3. Profit for politicians.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

You act like the default relationship with the government should be love. You should hate your government until they give you a reason not to.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Anonymous Coward]

Arrrr!

Be perfect for pirates.

Arrrr!

Re:kiwis use wikis

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

Now if only this would catch on... we might actually see laws that are representative of what the people want

At least, those who have and know how to use an internet connection, so you get a bias there. From what I've seen, there's far too much libertarianism to get a balanced and democratic decisions (no offense intended to libertarians out there).

And the process seems nevertheless a little too democratic, if you know what I mean. Would the people be able to know the ins and outs of creating a law? Would they be able to create/edit a law without creating loopholes?

Finally, the wiki model may not be the best model. Only those who can be bothered to change the law for themselves get a say, and people on the fringes of politics tend to be the most dedicated. Consequently, extremist laws will be in danger of being passed. Also, anyone who edits the wiki instantly changes the law to exactly what they want, so the leverage is far too great for just one person. They could fix that by adding in an administration a la Wikipedia, but that has its own problems. I don't know if we want messy IP blocking in a democratic process.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[seven7h]

I doubt if much of the additions put in this wiki will be actually used in creating the new Police Act, this is basically a PR campaign on the part of the NZ Police.

In the last few years the Police and therefore the Police act have been called into question because of a few incidents ( High profile court cases of Police being involved in inappropriate sex acts (including the Assistant Commissioner Clint Rickards) ,deaths in Police transport vehicles etc). In order to raise to public perception of the Police and to put out a new face and a new front this new Police Act is being drafted. By making it into a wiki this allows the police to make people feel that they are able to fix the problems with the police and then if something goes wrong again later the police can point at the wiki and say "Look, you helped create the law, it is partially your fault" allowing them to blame shift.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[MindKata]

"any editor can set a password on any page that can protect that page from being edited"

Very cool, a law wiki. Now what law do I want to create? ... I know, how about making it illegal to walk forwards on a Thursday. Anyone breaking this law, will be locked in stocks and flogged to death, with custard coated kippers.

Hmm... I think I sense a flaw in this law wiki idea.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Cal Paterson]

These two statements are both illogical, and the first one wasn't even the argument put forward by your parent.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Elemenope]

Hating your government for no good reason is nearly as silly as loving it on the same basis. I would say one should be rationally engaged and emotionally disinterested in their government unless and until that government unduly interferes in your life or perpetrates some act you consider to be unjust.

But maybe that's just me.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Anonymous Coward]

The default position towards a government should be distrust and cynicism, until they prove they are worthy of being treated otherwise. Hate for no good reason is silly, but history has given us lots of good reasons to hate government.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[darjen]

Hating your government for no good reason

Nonsense, there are plenty of good reasons to hate the government. And they give us more and more every day.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[jmac1492]

Or on the other hand, unless and until it does something helpful to you (defends you in a war, catches a criminal who wronged you, etc.)

Re:kiwis use wikis

[mdwh2]

Now if only this would catch on... we might actually see laws that are representative of what the people want instead of some asshole with a few hundred thousand dollars more than they should have in their pocket.

Careful though - what the majority want can lead to bad laws, for example when it comes to persecuting the minority. And a particular problem is that only some people will be bothered to spend time arguing on these Wikis - so you get laws more likely to be written by those who want to force their morals on other people, rather than giving an indication of what most people really think.

Plus, rich organisations are still in a position to mount a campaign to spread bias information about the proposed law, or to encourage people to edit the Wiki in their favour.

Having said that, I am curious to see what sort of laws a Wiki would turn out, especially on controversial issues. One benefit over things like voting or one-sided petitions is that editors actually have to see the exact wording of the law. Also, it may avoid the "paperclip" problem, where an unjust law is tacked onto a popular/sensible law; this way, people could edit out the unjust bits. Similarly, it helps in cases that may be supported by people because it's good in principle, but extremely badly worded, or overly broad - it would be possible for people to enter sensible amendments.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[DragonWriter]

Very cool, a law wiki. Now what law do I want to create? ... I know, how about making it illegal to walk forwards on a Thursday. Anyone breaking this law, will be locked in stocks and flogged to death, with custard coated kippers.

From the wiki's homepage:

On this site, wiki technology is paired with ongoing work to develop a Policing Act in 2008.

An official Bill is currently being written-up by parliamentary drafters, but in parallel there's an opportunity for others to suggest how a new Policing Act might look by contributing to a wiki Act. It'll be kept open until 1 November 2007, when the results can be fed back into the official law-making process.

Creating this online environment is a continuation of the open process used throughout the Police Act Review. It's all about encouraging a national conversation on policing.

The new Act will need to cover a wide range of topics, from high-level governance to day-to-day administration. To help get people started, we've included some headings and a few example ideas.

But don't feel constrained. For instance, if you'd prefer to work offline and upload a complete Act for others to comment on, by all means add it beneath the one we've started (there's a space provided under the "Alternative versions" heading).

Already, there's been heaps of interest in the wiki, with lots of people adding things, editing parts they feel can be improved, or offering alternatives. To help ensure positive ideas aren't lost, and provide a space for people to explain their suggestions, we've added discussion pages linking off the main pages.

Good luck!

So, no, I don't think you've found a flaw with the concept of this law wiki. I think you've found a flaw with a concept that you invented yourself when you saw the Slashdot summary, which isn't at all the same thing. This isn't a law carved in stone by wiki editors; the wiki is just adopted as a way to solicit public input that allows a number of different forms of input. There may well be flaws with that concept, but not the one you pointed to.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[ta bu shi da yu]

Yes, but what if what someone wants is to steal your property?

Given the track record of open Wikis to trend towards vandalism, I'm interested in what policies they are going to put into place to stop stupidity.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Elemenope]

Then we agree. I was arguing against was hating the government for no reason, i.e. as a starting position before evidence is brought to bear. If the evidence shows the government to be corrupt, malignant, malicious, inefficient, and/or inhumane, then by all means hate the government! All I'm saying is that a person should allow for the possibility that it isn't, and not prejudge the situation.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[shelterpaw]

Now if only this would catch on... we might actually see laws that are representative of what the people want instead of some asshole with a few hundred thousand dollars more than they should have in their pocket. Your idea makes sense if everybody is honest. However, you run into people creating bots that start representing one kook's idea of a good thing. That's one argument for and against anonymous web browsing. What's to stop some foreigner from trying to recreate public policy. If you had some form of local physical registration and then could use your user name and passcode to express your opinions, that would give a little more control. However, you're still eliminating a significant portion of the population that doesn't use the internet.

I think a better or an additional idea is to have a centralized site that has a simplified way to look up the way your representatives vote on issues and their attendance records. They would also have to give a detailed explanation of why they voted the way they did. They should also have professional non political writers summarize each proposed law with arguments from two angles. This would allow the common person to really judge their representative by his/her actions as opposed to his or her BS.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Anonymous Coward]

But maybe that's just me. --- fuck off

Re:kiwis use wikis

[proidiot]

If it is alright to become emotionally engaged when government acts unjustly, what is wrong with becoming emotionally when government acts justly in a way that seems counter to the action of most other governments (and/or counter to most other actions of that government)? Then again, regardless of the actions of other governments (or other actions of itself), with justice being relative anyways, why shouldn't justice be praised as much as injustice is criticized?

Re:kiwis use wikis

[BrokenHalo]

It might work. Just think of the possibilities...

New Police Act, Rule #1:
All policemen must wear clown suits...

Re:kiwis use wikis

[MindKata]

"I don't think you've found a flaw with the concept of this law wiki"

I think I've found a flaw in your ability to detect when people are joking!

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Bastard of Subhumani]

we might actually see laws that are representative of what the people want instead of some asshole with a few hundred thousand dollars

You might be onto something there. But I think it needs a snappier, soundbitey phrase. I'll throw in "Government of the people, by the people, for the people" just to get the ball rolling.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[aplusjimages]

I live here as well. Not New Zealand, but here and I have to tell you that the government is not so great as well. When is the constitution wiki coming out?

Re:kiwis use wikis

[jagdish]

kiwis use wikis (Score:5, Funny)
by Strange Ranger (454494)

Now thats what I call irony.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[kaffiene]

NZ tops the tables for lack of corruption, and we have a free press which has as it's default position "be hard on the government".

There's lots of reason to trust the government here because the political structure makes it hard (not impossible) to get away with corrupt practices.

This whole "hate the government no matter what" is a dumb point of view. You should be *critical* of your government, *hating* your government is stupid unless they give you a good reason (and I have hated various NZ governments in the past, but because of what they did, not just because they were the govt.)

Re:kiwis use wikis

[spazzmo]

I just corrected a typo on the page Principles of Policing (1)(h), beach -> breach.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[iKillCellphones]

Really?

Well maybe someone's gone back and unlocked the pages, because all of the links I tried on the "draft Policing Act" page of the wiki are certainly editable by guests.

Or perhaps you're referring to something else?

Re:kiwis use wikis

[musther]

Apparently they're restricting access to between business hours (9am - 4pm Monday - Friday, NZ time). I can't for the life of me see why!

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Tuoqui]

Cant be any worse than the uber-rich minority persecuting anyone without super wealth...

Polity and Custom of the Camiroi

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

This was a science fiction story in which anyone could create a law. The visitor from Earth created a law saying that only qualified people could create new laws, arguing that otherwise someone might create a stupid one. The native said "Someone just did, in fact". The revert happened almost immediately, and the visitor was advised not to start a revert war: the reverter was described as "very good with the ritual sword".

Re:Polity and Custom of the Camiroi

[Yoozer]

Mod parent up; excellent reference, and R.A. Lafferty is an underappreciated genius. 9 stupid laws means a severe loss of fingers; oh, how stumped the RIAA would be.

Re:Polity and Custom of the Camiroi

[miruku]

on a related note;

http://www.pyrsf.com/chapters/Wikiworld/Wikiworld.htm

Re:Polity and Custom of the Camiroi

[boyko.at.netqos]

I have no idea why that made me laugh - but it was hilarious. Thanks.

Vote for Deletion

[speaker of the truth]

I submit that the Title isn't notable enough with this google search only revealing one relevant link. As such I propose we delete this page.

Not such a good idea..

[Apoorv]

Opening a wiki for creating laws is insane. It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to formation of new laws, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes - it is an insane idea to write the actual law. But as a starting point, well, it's certainly an interesting way of gathering public submissions.

I'm sure it will go through the usual select committe reviews and everything else after this drafting, and I shall have options to make submissions again later..

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Anonymous Coward]

Opening a wiki for creating laws is insane. It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to formation of new laws, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation.

Yeah. I heard that someone also had a wiki to build an encyclopedia, but that's just as insane. It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to an informative and complete reference, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[TallGuyRacer]

Nobody said the result would definitely be used. The wiki is just being used to get suggestions and ideas...

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Anonymous Coward]

I would have phrased it as "HOLY FUCKING DUMB," but whatever works.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, who are these people who seem to think that the unwashed masses should have a hand in regulating society!?

Keep power where power belongs: in the hands of those with money, guns and mass-media outlets. That's how you get efficient and obscure lawmaking the way it's supposed to be done.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[ComradeSnarky]

This strikes me as a blatant abuse of the wiki system. Wikis are primarily for pages where only one definitive version is required, eg. encyclopedia articles or documentation pages. If you're looking to solicit various opinions on what the law should be like, then why would they use a wiki? If I think X should be on the law and someone else thinks it doesn't then whose edit is correct? There will be a lot of edit wars that cannot be resolved simply because there is no "correct answer". If I wanted to find out what fruit people liked would I start a wiki with the title "What is your favourite fruit"? The first person would come along and write "banana", and then the next person would erase that and write "apple", then "orange", etc. and anyone who saw the page would not know what fruit most people really liked, all they would know is the favourite fruit of the last person who happened to edit the wiki.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[heinousjay]

Laws cannot be open to discussion or question? So you invite totalitarianism?

Re:Not such a good idea..

[dangitman]

Laws have to be constant, same for everyone, and not open to discussion or question.

WTF? Laws should be constant? So slavery never should have been abolished, I guess. They should not be open for discussion? Sounds like fascism to me.

It should be the exact opposite - laws should change to reflect the times, and they should be constantly discussed and questioned.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[KimmoV]

especially since governments around the world are known to be cradles of efficiency and cost-effectiveness

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Apoorv]

They can only be modified when a need to do so is felt by a major part of a country.

Ahem.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[ThirdPrize]

What he was saying is that if you get a speeding ticket, you shouldn't be able to go in, edit the law to exclude everyone with your surname and then tear the ticket up. He says afterwards that laws should change where and when necessary.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[bm_luethke]

"Yeah. I heard that someone also had a wiki to build an encyclopedia, but that's just as insane. It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to an informative and complete reference, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation."

I see you have used the wikipedia and attempted to pass it off as an authoritative source.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[merlinokos]

GP hopefully meant:
Consistent: 2. Reliable; steady: demonstrated a consistent ability to impress the critics. Meaning that laws should be the same for everybody (applied consistently).

Re:Not such a good idea..

[umghhh]

Well I second that. I see no reason why the new technologies cannot help democracy to return to its roots i.e. everybody could and should take part in decision process. Just in case people forgot: partof decision making is discussion on available options, methods and leadership among other things.
Of course size matters here so the state organisations (big) cannot have their daily life led by democracy but the goals, the way to achieve them and the leadership that leads us there should be decided in a process at least approaching democratic way. What we have now in majority of western 'democracies' is a sad joke (yes I know there are people less fortunate than we are and not even majority of them live in N.Korea) based on the fact that it was not possible to vote for anything else than your representatives (who then could do what they wanted for few years). Now we have the technology to democratize our societies again - maybe we should use the chance.
If not we who would do it for us???

Re:Not such a good idea..

[discord5]

So slavery never should have been abolished, I guess.

Know your place, plebe, and let the aristocracy speak first and for all. Now if you'll excuse me, it's time for the daily slave orgy.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[TapeCutter]

Exactly, but when the big end of town talks about self-regulation I don't think they envision the general population taking part.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Anonymous Coward]

Americans... they will never get used to democracy, like in Australia and New Zeland... They prefer to have the NSA wiretapping them illegally, have crazy ill-paid cops tasering and shooting them, or have some white kids tying them to a tree and set them on fire...

Re:Not such a good idea..

[neoform]

Slavery outlawed!? Slow down there greenhorn, the law clearly states you must pay daily homage to Pharaoh! Laws are not to be changed, that's why they're law!

Re:Not such a good idea..

[DragonWriter]

Opening a wiki for creating laws is insane.

This is not a wiki for creating laws. It is a wiki for public input on laws that are being drafted by legislators.

It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to formation of new laws, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation.

There's a lot of manpower and money that goes through separating wheat from chaff in public comments submitted in input on legislation no matter what the form, that's unavoidable. The only way to avoid that is to have a legislature that ignores the public.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[FiloEleven]

Laws cannot be like that. Laws have to be constant, same for everyone, and not open to discussion or question. Bull. Shit.

The aim of laws is to maintain order and to promote justice. They are much better at the first than the second, which is why you'll see an abundance of them in a police state. Now, I might simply be an idealist, but my belief is that order can be maintained by providing justice, which is difficult enough that in America we have an entire branch of government (ideally) devoted to the task of ensuring that the application of the law is just in each and every case.

Laws cannot be constant because situations change constantly. Another poster brought up slavery, which was a good point. We are not at the pinnacle of society nor anywhere close to it on the whole. I am certain that we still have unjust laws that we aren't even aware of. Would you have us keep them simply because they're already on the books when it comes out that they are harming a segment of our society?

In most cases I agree that laws should be the same for everyone, but even here there are extenuating circumstances - what about the retarded man who accidentally killed someone in anger for repeatedly provoking him? Is prison with a murder rap the most just sentence? Justice is not always clear-cut or easy to find, and it is for that reason that our laws must be mutable and the application of them flexible to a degree.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Cigarra]

What he was saying is that if you get a speeding ticket, you shouldn't be able to go in, edit the law to exclude everyone with your surname and then tear the ticket up.

Well of course, that's obvious. It's reasonable to asume the wiki will be used to build a draft of the law, which will be later passed by the Congress, and "locked for edition".

Re:Not such a good idea..

[canuck57]

Opening a wiki for creating laws is insane. It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to formation of new laws, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation.

Do you mean like our partisan bickering elected officials?

I think this is great. Not as open as I would like it but sure better than "government knows best".

Yep, there will be some hard up loser that will deface the pages, but there will also be the insightful post and ideas come forth.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Curmudgeonlyoldbloke]

Actually, I think the people editing Uncyclopedia are doing an excellent job...

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Bit-Simple]

I think that the Wiki approach to drafting laws is not to practical, like other people have said.

But I have often thought that using and Open Source development model for drafting laws would be more suitable.

Laws contracts and software seem to have a lot in common; they are designed to meet a particular functional purpose; they are algorithmic in nature; they must often function in somewhat unpredictable and changing operating environments; their designers need to consider all eventualities; they must be robust enough to withstand attempts to subvert their original function by third parties with large resources and malicious intent.

Basically writing laws is a software development problem, your country is the hardware.

A more open source/community development approach to writing laws would include accepting contributions, keeping discussions open and on-line. Fixing bugs/loopholes as they are reported. Working out ways to test a law's effectiveness against it's stated aims.

Laws could be that appear successful could be borrowed by anyone who needs them. E.g. a law that was developed and tested in Europe could be incorporate cost free into South American Statute book cost free with minor modifications.

Or a robust law could be developed forked by different interested parties to give it a Democrat or Republican spin.

Voters would ask serious questions if a party started deploying laws that weren't developed by some kind of robust open community process.

nice!

[i_b_don]

Hm... so this means that young male techno-savy people are going to write the laws now? What do you think they will be?

1. Piracy is legal for any copyright that is represented by the RIAA or MPAA
2. Cute girls can't wear shirts
3. The new legal drinking age is 13
4. People over 50 aren't allowed to vote

???

d

Re:nice!

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see how any of these is a bad thing.

Re:nice!

[Anonymous Coward]

you forgot a couple of oblig steps
5. ???
6. Profit!!

Re:nice!

[Anonymous Coward]

Cute girls can't wear shirts

New Zealand, I'm coming!

Re:nice!

[mwvdlee]

2. Cute girls can't wear shirts

So now they'll be wearing raincoats and turtleneck sweaters.
Thanks, dude.

Re:nice!

[Siberwulf]

Its a wiki! Go in and edit it to say "tops" instead of "shirts"!

Re:nice!

[RobBebop]

Good start... but you forget a few....

5. Mandatory tax breaks for men ages 18-35.

6. Make it illegal to broadcast advertisements which are objectionable (that is, where law #2 is broken).

7. Euthanasia for rebels who object to any of these laws.

Re:nice!

[sakasune]

2. Cute girls can't wear shirts

So now they'll be wearing raincoats and turtleneck sweaters.
Thanks, dude.

How narrow-minded you are - just outlaw any tops for the cute girls!
I'm sure there's a "???" and "Profit!" to be done there...

Excellent

[skeftomai]

I think having the community develop laws together is a rather superb way of handling society. The more people, (generally) the better (IMO). The more people that have their hand in this, the less likely something will be left out. Also, since everyone in that society will have to live with those laws, I think it's best that the majority has the opportunity to shape those laws (granted, not everyone will likely use this wiki, but I think the concept is good).

Doing it this way, the way I see it, has the potential to mend gaps between people groups in a society by allowing them to discuss their ideas and explain and collaborate their ideas carefully.

I wish more governments could be run this way -- moreso by the people.

And having this online provides an excellent communication medium.

Re:Excellent

[jonbritton]

And having this online provides an excellent communication medium.

And limited to middle-class folks with computers and Internet connections..

I'm sure NZ's Maori population is offering a collective sound that translates roughly to, "whoop-dee-fucking-doo."

Re:Excellent

[kiwipeso]

I don't know about ruling out Maori people from the net. Let's face it, it's usually $2 for half an hour at a net cafe.
Hell, even a really bad busker can make that in ten minutes on courtney place. (Less time in Auckland)
Besides, it's not exclusively online. Just free online, otherwise you can buy a hard copy of the proposal and make a submission by freepost.

Re:Excellent

[chord.wav]

The more people, (generally) the better (IMO)

At some point, you'll have to limit the number of participating nodes or you will clog the network with communication's overhead (AKA trying to keep everybody happy).

Re:Excellent

[pcgc1xn]

This law is also well suited to collaborative development, as it should not be hugely controversial.

The Police Act is the law which gives the Police their authority to act on events which other laws (like the Crimes Act) have made illegal. The Crimes Act says growing drugs is illegal, the Police Act says that the Police can only break down doors looking for it if they have followed x procedure.

One of the biggest problems with laws is where there is inconsistency or vagueness leading to unintended consequences. Many eyes will help catch a lot of these.

Re:Excellent

[Jorgandar]

Though not quite the same, but in california, regular joe schmoe people can write laws. It's called a proposition. And it needs, oh, 100,000 signatures or something like that to go to ballot.

Not so cool

[speaker of the truth]

While on the one hand getting feedback in this manner is good, satirizing them is also important. So its one step back one step forward for the New Zealand government.

Re:Not so cool

[pimpimpim]

If it goes on like this they will end up being pretty good line-dancers!

why is it...

[User 956]

Why do i get the impression that the new Police Act will consist mainly of LOLcats?

Re:why is it...

[Titoxd]

No, it will probably be something more along the lines of "Eric is a fag and his face is punishable by law." ~~~~

Re:why is it...

[Anonymous Coward]

Or Greco-Roman style wrestling matches to choose the Police Commissioner?

27 September 2007 at 17:23 PM by Moderator -
Changed line 3 from:

(2) To ensure that the Commissioner of Police is impartial and acts in the interests of justice, the nominated person must be able to beat the Governor-General in a wrestling match, Greco-Roman style.
to:

(2) To ensure that the Commissioner of Police is impartial and acts in the interests of justice, the nominated person must be a Justice of the Court or former Justice of the Court with no less than 10 years experience, of which no less than 5 years shall have been at the level of the High Court or above. It seems most of the edits in the wiki are made by anonymous individuals inserting jokes, which are then reverted by the moderators.

I think this wiki is a great idea, but it should have been done differently. The people within the government writing the law should have exclusive edit access to the wiki. They draft the law as they normally would - except they use the wiki instead of a word processor. Anyone from the internet can recommend changes, which must then be approved by those writing the laws on the wiki.

Re:why is it...

[nateb]

I can has legal representation?

Re:why is it...

[RealGrouchy]

It'll be a step up from the smiley-ridden current version, which was created collaboratively on Usenet in the early '90s.

- RG>

Re:why is it...

[AnonymousDivinity]

Why do i get the impression that the new Police Act will consist mainly of LOLcats?
I can has habeas corpus plzkthx?

Re:why is it...

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you're right... Found this: Section III, Paragraph 2, Part (a) "At all times Ceiling-Cop will watch you masturbate." And a little later: "If you has a bucket, they not be stealin' your bucket."

Re:why is it...

[jez9999]

No, it will probably be something more along the lines of "Eric is a fag and his face is punishable by law." ~~~~

Been posting on Wikipedia too much?

Re:why is it...

[Titoxd]

No, not really. [Note: takes a while to load.]

~~~~

An alternative

[Apoorv]

A much better way to gather public opinion on the law would be online voting for passing of bills from the legislation. The masses can decide on that better than the President alone.

Re:An alternative

[speaker of the truth]

You mean like some sort of election process of what law people want that is done electronically?

Re:An alternative

[Apoorv]

OK, maybe I don't know what the situation is in NZ, but here's how it works in India. We have a ruling political party, and the opposition party (who lose in the elections, and are just next to the ruling party). The members of parliament put forward their suggestions relating to political stuff, and laws too. People of the legislative assembly vote in favour or against it. If it is passed by a majority, it goes to the president for his signature. After signatures from the president, the 'bill' becomes an official 'law'. What I was suggesting that instead of sending it to the Prez, put it online for voting, and make it a 'law', if a majority votes in favour of it.

Re:An alternative

[kiwipeso]

Umm, no. We don't have a president. That would require a mature attitude to politics :-)
We are a realm of the commonwealth, basically the Governor-General looks after us on behalf of the Queen.
We only get to elect Parliament, local government and health boards.

However, I would agree that the masses (Auckland) and the Rest Of New Zealand (RONZ) know better than politicians.

Re:An alternative

[ZeroExistenZ]

I've thought this over myself, but it wouldn't work: The problem with that is, that not everyone can keep track of *all bills*. If all bills are passed online, in a forum, I only would have an hour of "free time" a day to spend reading and voting on those bills. As a result the process isn't entirely representative for a certain demography.

People who do have alot of time on their hands and are interested to spend that time on reading and voting on bills would be able to put more weight to their views, which aren't necessary mine. So I'd need a representative, who is able to spend alot of time representing my views. Hence a party.
Too bad this isn't always the way it works in current governments. (I can't really understand how the US ended up with only two parties; overhere we have at least five, and in that handfull of parties I don't find a complete match with my views.)

Re:An alternative

[kiwipeso]

New Zealand follows the German MMP system. We have one house of representatives. We will have 121 Seats unless there is another overhang next year. About half are directly elected, of which 7 are Maori seats. The rest are list seats allocated by putting in party nominees according to their share after counting what they won.

So, to get represented in parliament, you either need to win : a general electorate, a maori electorate or 5% of the party votes.

What this means is simple, Labour or National win a load of ordinary seats and fill with up a few list MPs.
NZFirst gets the elderly and the patriot vote. Sure to be there. :-(
Greens get the young and the hippy vote. Like the smell of their voters, sure to be there. :-P
Act gets the ambitious and business vote. Too well funded to lose, but I like them more than others. :-)
Maori party, gets enough of the Maori seats and Pacific Islander votes to be there. A new party.

That irrelevant few that split up and now have bugger all chance. (One has gone to be the christian party with the MP who is in the first corruption trial.)

What would be easier would be if you are just going to make laws into online referenda (with postal voting allowed).

Re:An alternative

[Anonymous Coward]

Act gets the right-wing and rich amoral bastard vote

Fixed that for you.

Re:An alternative

[Domstersch]

A nitpick: we have 120 seats in a non-overhang House of Representatives, not 121.

Re:An alternative

[Anonymous Coward]

> The problem with that is, that not everyone can keep track of *all bills*. If all bills are passed online, in a forum, I only would have an hour of "free time" a day to spend reading and voting on those bills. As a result the process isn't entirely representative for a certain demography.

First off, do you think the representatives read the bills they're voting on? :)

Secondly, you're pointing out the symptom. The problem is that there are too many bills.

There are already plenty of fraud, assault, and reckless-driving laws already on the books. Do you really need three new crimes consisting of the old crimes with the string "with a computer" or "with a taser" or "with a cell phone" appended to their descriptions?

Re:An alternative

[kiwipeso]

This time it's 121 with overhang, next time it's 121 without overhang. I think. Or am I just too drunk to get it right?

Re:An alternative

[kiwipeso]

Yes, well I'm on the right wing side. Wish that I was in the rich, right wing side. But definately not in favor of the amoral faction. (However, i do like the amoral faction. They are the most likely to take out the christian party.) :-)

Re:An alternative

[DragonWriter]

People who do have alot of time on their hands and are interested to spend that time on reading and voting on bills would be able to put more weight to their views, which aren't necessary mine. So I'd need a representative, who is able to spend alot of time representing my views. Hence a party.
Too bad this isn't always the way it works in current governments.

Well, one reason it may not work that way in real governments is that, even with a representative, you have the same effect going on: the people that have the time and interest in influencing legislation spend a lot of time, money, and effort presenting arguments and "facts" (sometimes actual facts, sometimes not) supporting their position to legislators, the people who lack time or interest or both don't, and so the former group is overrepresented in exactly the same way they would be in a direct democracy.

(I can't really understand how the US ended up with only two parties; overhere we have at least five, and in that handfull of parties I don't find a complete match with my views.)

In the US we have pretty much always had two major national political parties (though which two has changed over time), and each state one or two major local parties (in rare cases, not the same two major parties as the national parties -- e.g., before the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party merged with the Democratic Party after the New Deal, it had displaced the locally-weak Democratic Party to become the second major party in Minnesota, and actually had then displaced the Republican Party as the dominant party in that state) because the structure of our electoral systems at almost every level encourage two parties; winner-take-all elections, particularly plurality elections, do that, and all of our elections for federal office are single-winner, and most are plurality (the Presidential election is a bit weird, but with, IIRC, two exceptions each state election for Presidential electors is a winner-take-all plurality election for multiple electors.)

A system where more elections are conducted in a more proportional manner will tend have more parties (and, generally, better popular satisfaction with government).

Re:An alternative

[dufus4]

Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: Yes, the size of Parliament is prescribed by law at exactly 120 seats, plus any electorate seats won by parties that didn't get enough votes for one seat proportionately (so the maximum possible size after the next election is 190, if every electorate is won by a candidate of a party receiving no votes; the minimum is always 120).

A Public Relations exercise

[gihan_ripper]

From the wiki (emphasis mine):

An official Bill is currently being written-up by parliamentary drafters, but in parallel there's an opportunity for others to suggest how a new Policing Act might look by contributing to a wiki Act.

OK, it's unrealistic to believe that New Zealand would let anyone write the law. That would lead to anarchy. However, what they're doing is trying to get people interested in the law-making process, and in the laws themselves by opening up this wiki. I can see a number of purposes this could serve:

1. Educational: teaches citizens about laws and law-making.
2. Political: by getting citizens involved in the process, they're more likely to support the new Act.
3. Police PR: gets citizens to think about policing in a new way and perhaps gain a new respect for the Police.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[bug1]

"OK, it's unrealistic to believe that New Zealand would let anyone write the law. That would lead to anarchy."

Quite the opposite.

Anarchy is the absense in laws, so letting anyone write laws would move New Zealand further away from anarchy.

Allowing anyone to repeal laws might lead to anarchy.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[Anonymous Coward]

Who the heck says it would lead to anarchy? Anarchy pops like a soap bubble the second two people agree to keep a rule; then it's a struggling young government.

We already have representative democracy, where any loony can vote any other loony into office to go make laws for us. Now here's direct democracy - possible for the first time in history because of technology. Yes, it will be a mess and if it takes over, it will be a stinking pile of shit - so how is this worse than any other form of government?

You know what I wish we used here in the United States? An Ouija board! At least then somebody would do some good 1/26th of the time.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[afroborg]

Police PR: gets citizens to think about policing in a new way and perhaps gain a new respect for the Police.

OK, as a New Zealander, I can tell you that the Police in NZ need all the help they can get in that regard - no-one likes them much at all. Probably because the only time we ever see them is when they're giving out speeding tickets...

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[Anonymous Coward]

"OK, it's unrealistic to believe that New Zealand would let anyone write the law. That would lead to anarchy."

or even democracy

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[Cal Paterson]

anarchy

This word is not a flashcard for any political situation you dislike. The fact that you are writing law means that the situation, by definition cannot be anarchic, and I think you know that.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you. For those still having trouble grasping the concept of anarchy, I have two points which sum it up nicely:

1. Anarchy is not defined by a lack of rules, but a lack of rulers.

2. Anarchy is to statism as atheism is to religion.

I'm not asking anyone to abandon their belief or trust in the state; I'm asking them to recognize the concept of anarchy for what it really means, not for what the state wants you to believe.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[Anonymous Coward]

Monarchists were saying the same thing about representative democracy a few hundred years ago.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[Reziac]

4. Give the police a new respect for the citizens -- "Gee, maybe they're not so stupid after all!!"

,
,

BTW, 2m 41s on the 50 states, not bad for being in no rush :)

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[aliquis]

Not to mention that people are less likely to break the law if it makes sense for the average person.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[gihan_ripper]

Yes you're right. I realised my mistake just after I made the post, but subsequently forgot to correct it. My bad!

However, I still don't think that law-making by the people is a particularly good idea. I imagine that it would just lead to a tyranny of the majority. Moreover, it could lead to a real marginalisation of the disenfranchised (that means children, criminals, and illegal immigrants).

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[kiwipeso]

Well, most children are drunken thieving teenagers. Criminals are targeted by the police, dumbass!
And illegal immigrants are usually involved in other illegal activities, such as importing drugs, kidnapping asian students or associated with terrorists. (Like Ahkmed Zaoui was before he came to New Zealand).

Personally, I want all child criminals to be banned from having sweets until they turn 18. Just for spite!

*cough*

[Verte]

"People are calling it 'extreme democracy' and perhaps it is." Actually, we've had a word for it for a long time: Communism.

Re:*cough*

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's actually called direct democracy.

Re:*cough*

[suv4x4]

"People are calling it 'extreme democracy' and perhaps it is." Actually, we've had a word for it for a long time: Communism.

Communism and democracy is apples and oranges. Get your fact straight.

Communism corresponds to centralised economic model, versus free market. Democracy corresponds to the model of law regulation and separation of powers in the country. Versus, say totalitarian regime.

Re:*cough*

[Verte]

Democracy corresponds to elected officials setting law. Communism is a great many things, it is a social and an economic model first and foremost, but communism, as opposed to social democracy, is the idea that the sum [or a random selection, similar to a jury] of the population set government policy.

Re:*cough*

[SamP2]

Communism will be an "extreme democracy" the day fascism will be a "benevolent dictatorship".

Re:*cough*

[dangitman]

Communism will be an "extreme democracy" the day fascism will be a "benevolent dictatorship".

Isn't that day today? And yesterday, and the day before? "Benevolent Dictatorships" are exactly how fascism thrives. Keeping the trains running on time, building freeways, holding the Superbowl - that kind of thing. Without the bread and circuses, the fascists wouldn't remain in power so easily.

Re:*cough*

[Max Littlemore]

Communism and democracy is apples and oranges. Get your fact straight.

Not quite. Communism is to democracy as an apple is to a faulty hand-brake.

Re:*cough*

[Verte]

Communism will be, the day fascism will be a "benevolent dictatorship".

We have never and will never see it, so we know nothing. I didn't mean to come off as trolling, and I'm surprised I haven't been modded down for it yet. Because, just like the idealism that is communism, we will never see governments really listening. Much like we can complain about all the wonderfully simple things microsoft or intel could have done for us -their interest is not primarily to serve their customers, we are just lucky, or unlucky, to have their products- their interest is themselves, and all the wikis in the world won't change that.

Re:*cough*

[suv4x4]

Communism is a great many things, it is a social and an economic model first and foremost, but communism, as opposed to social democracy, is the idea that the sum [or a random selection, similar to a jury] of the population set government policy.

No, please, I asked you to get your facts straight.

There's difference between the way most communistic countries developed in practice, the way it's described by ideologists, and the way it's described to the citizens in the the propaganda communist governments spread out.

It's perfectly possible to have both democracy and communism at the same time. They are not mutually exclusive.

You could ask: then why virtually any known communist government I know uses the totalitarian model, well this is because this is the model that develops when you overthrow the previous government with force. After revolution, it's always totalitarian regime.

Many modern democratic countries have implemented and running ideas from communism in SOME sectors of their economy, but they just don't call it that way (historical burden on the term itself).

As I've said many times before, we'll see ideas we thought mutually exclusive before (like libertarian ideas and communism) play together in an increasingly complex landscape of our national and international economies. It's just the result of increased complexity and the need to handle plenty of "special cases" in the interest of society (and various other interests...).

Re:*cough*

[Verte]

A word of advice first: being overbearing doesn't get you anywhere here, so please, examine your own argument before talking about facts.

he way it's described to the citizens in the the propaganda communist governments spread out.

See, there's your mistake. Should be:

he way it's described to the citizens in the the propaganda fascist governments spread out.

Because they are not communist, not the slightest.

The problem is the American definition of "Communist countries". It tends to include places like China and Cuba. They are a better approximation than the USA, of course, but are still hardly communist. For example, the Chinese communist party was slaughtered after the revolution by the socialist party. Though they have a slight socialist edge where trade is concerned, the people do not own the means of production, the people do not run the government, and even on the economics side, it would be strange to call China communist. A better example economics-wise might be Singapore.

The problem is, there has never been a communist country. The existence of one would require a government or millitia giving up their power. That just doesn't happen. People like Stalin or Castro or groups like the Chinese Socialist party will always manage to stop communism from becoming a reality.

But that has nothing to do with what we are talking about here today, other than that Marx and Lenin mused on the idea of real democracy long before we had wiki.

Re:*cough*

[iamacat]

Besides, there just haven't been enough communist countries for later ones to learn from negative experience of their predecesors. I hear first slave rebellions did not end well and first capitalist countries inflicted unspeakable human right abuse as well as killing their own economy with overproduction crisis.

Re:*cough*

[freedom_india]

Communism is NOT a social or Economic Model.

Socialism is an economic model.

Communism is a form of Government where there is only one party allowed to participate and there is supposed to a good deal of healthy debate on who should be allowed to stand in elections.
Communism also holds regular elections. The candidates are nominated by the Party and the people have a choice voting Yes or NO for the candidate. If NO, then the Party has to send another candidate to stand.
This forces the Party to listen to people when allowing them to choose their representatives.
Communism aimed to reduce the cost-overhead of multiple-party democracy like the Weimar Republic which was the finest democracy but died under its own weight of parties.

All other democracies today are flawed to make them work.

Communism did not mean terrorising people, although it was very easy for a single Party in power to do so.
  Karl Max envisaged a situation where people were unselfish and this clearly separated the individual from the power he held as an official.
For instance i could be a commisar in the KGB and if i find another college dude romping with my GF, am NOT supposed to drag this guy to Lubyanka.

Unfortunately that is not possible, since human beings are selfish by nature.

Maybe when we find alien life and IT has communism that is actually working we may see a vast difference.

Re:*cough*

[Peaker]

After revolution, it's always totalitarian regime.

What about the Founding Fathers' revolution?

What about the greek revolt against their monarch that set up their more democratic regime?

Re:*cough*

[MartinB]

The problem is the American definition of "Communist countries". It tends to include places like China and Cuba. They are a better approximation than the USA, of course, but are still hardly communist.

*Ping* give Verte a coconut. The Cuban revolution in particular was never an ideologically Communist-led event. While Castro's intent most certainly did have an element of removal of the externally imposed landowners and distribution of their assets to the people, this is more popularism than pure Communism. Castro would then (and does now) prefer to be compared to Jose Marti than Joseph Stalin.

Once Cuba was isolated from the US, and their chief economic partner became the USSR (for the same reasons seen in many US client states), it became expedient to absorb some of the Communist rhetoric to facilitate that economic support.

People like Stalin or Castro or groups like the Chinese Socialist party will always manage to stop communism from becoming a reality.

...and it's likely to be heartening to the CIA to see people conflating those three. Although it's puzzling that the historically least Communistic of the three states is the one still being ostracised by the US. Beyond realpolitik of the blockvote of the former Cuban landlords swinging Florida in the Electoral College (and sheer bloodymindedness), there's no lasting reason for it.

(King eh? I never voted for yer)

Re:*cough*

[LindaMack]

Can someone explain why this is modded troll? Sometimes I think the moderations are handed out by non-human entities...

Re:*cough*

[randomaxe]

Except that communism is an economic system and not a system of government. Thanks for playing, though.

citation needed

[Anonymous Coward]

Police officers may not shoot people at random [citation needed]

Re:citation needed

[MadMidnightBomber]

Universal declaration of human rights, article 3.

A recent attempt to add subsection "3.i That means you as well, Bush" was vetoed by one of the permanent members of the security council.

Re:citation needed

[rmcnam]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/4217130a11.html

Re:citation needed

[autophile]

Traffic tickets may be given for speeds more than 15 mph above the norm [citation given].

It's not a good time to be a police officer in NZ

[The Ancients]

The timing relating to certain issues is not good.

Direct democracy via the web...

[dgun]

...would be like Slashdot users deciding stuff that actually matters. Do you really want that?

Re:Direct democracy via the web...

[MassiveForces]

As a New Zealander, I don't know whether to be joyfull or afraiad, all I know is that we'll have some sick copyright laws ^^

Re:Direct democracy via the web...

[dgun]

sick copyright laws

^^ lol. The GPL would become the law of the land. And all mp3 downloads would be legal.

Re:Direct democracy via the web...

[Verte]

As long as potential bills contain Cowboy Neil options.

Re:Direct democracy via the web...

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean like Digg?

Re:Direct democracy via the web...

[Anonymous Coward]

The existing systems aren't much better than Slashdot editors and moderators. You won't notice a difference.

Did you read the article?

[Jane Q. Public]

The wiki does not allow people to write law. It is just for citizen input.

this just means

[evwah]

this just means that every so often you will go to look up the law, and the text will have been replaced with "POOP COCK POOP". This could lead to some interesting legal situations.

Wow...

[nebaz]

According to the New Zealand Police Act, the elephant population has tripled in New Zealand.

Re:Wow...

[RuBLed]

so that is where this came from:

The New Zealand Mounted Police would receive epic mounts compared to the normal mounts used by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police [thotbot]

Re:Wow...

[peterprior]

This might be true: If there are 0 elephants in New Zealand, tripling that would still result in 0 elephants in New Zealand.

WikiWar

[Big Nothing]

This smells of WikiWar all the way from the other side of the globe:

"Smoking marihuana is <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>leghal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>legzzal</s> <s>illegal</s> <s>zzzZZZzzz</s> illegal!"

Re:WikiWar

[Anonymous Coward]

Off-topic is more like it. The Wiki is about an Act that will control the operation, powers, and behaviour of the Police force not other laws that they will have to enforce.

Re:WikiWar

[TheRaven64]

How about:

Smoking marijuana is <blink>il</blink>legal. That ought to keep everyone happy.

Re:WikiWar

[Big Nothing]

"How about:

Smoking marijuana is <blink>il</blink>legal.

That ought to keep everyone happy."

The blink tag makes noone happy.

Re:WikiWar

[noamsml]

Dude, every time I blinked, it blinked!

Re:WikiWar

[Anonymous Coward]

Schrödingers law: You do not the exact contents of the law until you have printed it.

Peelian Principles

[TheLink]

I think the Peelian Principles are still good and sound:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_Principles

If only my country's police force would follow them.

Re:Populus, not populous

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

The word they're looking for is populus? A sort of tree?

Extreme optimism

[clarkkent09]

You've obviously never seen myspace

Re:Extreme optimism

[skeftomai]

True, but I think having a revision system in place definitely helps. Wikipedia seems to be working fairly well.

Re:Extreme optimism

[skeftomai]

(I have seen MySpace...I meant that I saw what you were getting at).

Not Practical In The U.S.

[Jane Q. Public]

As pointed out elsewhere, the people who would participate are too self-selecting. They would just be too small a segment of the U.S. population.

On the other hand, there is something to be said for "participatory" government. The people who take the trouble to speak up are the ones who are heard.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[dangitman]

As pointed out elsewhere, the people who would participate are too self-selecting. They would just be too small a segment of the U.S. population.

Well, yes. Citizens of New Zealand would be a very small segment of the US population.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[sqrt(2)]

Right, it would never work in the USA. If only there was some way to get the word out before we started doing it. Maybe even provide a way for people to use the internet for free if they don't have access at home. Then there's the apathy, why the hell would people care about having a say in the laws they'll be required to obey?

Way too impractical for the US. Democracy is better off left in the capable hands of our trustworthy and honorable representatives in Washington.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[Jane Q. Public]

Well, yes... but considering the context of my comment, that would mean New Zealand people getting involved in the politics of the U.S.

While they might have a lot of interesting things to say, I don't think I would support giving them the vote.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[ricree]

As pointed out elsewhere, the people who would participate are too self-selecting. They would just be too small a segment of the U.S. population.

Which is, of course, a significant change from the current state of affairs. After all, we have such a broad range of people participating in the government today, and we'd hate to do anything to upset the balance.

Seriously, though, the problem isn't that we'd get a narrow group of participants, because we already have a lot of that at the moment. At the very least, we'd tend to attract people who get their news from a much wider variety of sources than the current "Everything that Rush Limbaugh and Fox News says is the gospel truth" crowd that seems so dominant in politics at the moment. The real problem is that it will still be just as heavily dominated by corporate interests as the current system is. Thanks to the anonymity of the internet, corporations are free to just pay hordes of well written people to make sure that the bill shapes up in exactly the way that they want it to. In the current system, at least, we are able to tell who is a lobbyist. In an online setting, I don't think it would be nearly that simple.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[Jane Q. Public]

Wikipedia has some VERY serious flaws. For example, it is too vulnerable to vandalism, even though that vandalism is often easily fixable... if anyone happens to notice it in a timely manner.

There are other flaws as well. From my own participation, for example, I have found that often certain groups of people will "take over" a topic as "their own", and interfere with input from outside sources, however valid that input may be. In some ways this is analogous to problems we see today with "peer review" in scientific journals.

Wikipedia would be a disastrous model for anything having to do with government. It relies too much on the "good nature" of contributors. As we see very often, some people simply don't have any. And that is double true when it comes to government.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[britneys 9th husband]

Wikipedia would be a disastrous model for anything having to do with government. It relies too much on the "good nature" of contributors. As we see very often, some people simply don't have any. And that is double true when it comes to government. I agree. Some defense contractor might get on there and write a law mandating that the pentagon only buy certain supplies from them. Or the corn farmers might pass a law requiring corn products in gasoline. Imagine the government paying people to grow tobacco, thanks to some philip morris employee. Taxes on blank CDs paid directly to record companies. Copyright holders extending the copyright term just as their stuff is about to enter the public domain. We must not have wiki laws, they would be a disaster!

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[kiwipeso]

I don't know. I personally know a new zealander who is a US citizen who might disagree.

And as a dual citizen of New Zealand and the West Island, I would personally be annoyed if I had to give up my right to vote in the West Island. (not that I have yet, but if John Howard gets back in, it'd be a very sad day.)

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[mdwh2]

[citation needed] - people often claim theoretical flaws with Wikipedia, but rarely cite examples of this going wrong in practice.

There are other flaws as well. From my own participation, for example, I have found that often certain groups of people will "take over" a topic as "their own", and interfere with input from outside sources, however valid that input may be.

The key point which keeps Wikipedia going is that there are some fundamental policies which must be kept to. It isn't a complete free-for-all. If people take over a topic, there are places on Wikipedia to raise the issue, to get other editors to take a look. These editors don't need to know about the subject matter - they just see which side is supported by reliable sources. Anyone who continues to edit war by breaking the fundamental policies risks getting blocked.

Now we get to the problem with a law wiki - it's not clear what fundamental policies one could have. If a group "take over" and write a bad law, it's not clear what neutral policies you could use to claim that law was bad, and get it reverted.

You might say things like "claims made to support a law must always be supported by evidence". Though at least here in the UK, the Government themselves are incapable of doing that (and have in some cases stated upfront that it is fine to pass a law in the absence of evidence).

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[Eivind Eklund]

mdwh2, they need to know the subject area. This has e.g. been a problem with the neuro linguistic programming area, where there have been a number of people that have been specifically trying to dig up anything they can to discredit NLP. Now, it is fairly easy to discredit large areas of NLP, yet they've kept digging up directly false references and using them to add in discredit - e.g, citing summarizers that claim that parts of Scientology is included in NLP and central to it (I don't remember the exact term used at the moment). Those of us that are familiar with NLP can immediately tell that this false - however, digging up references that say "XYZ is not part of NLP" is roughly impossible, as the definition of NLP is fairly vague.

So, people can "squat" a topic area and push it towards an ideological direction, and they can do so by the investment of time - and defending against it can be harder than doing the attack. Expertise in the area is needed. (I actually asked in the talk page, point blank, if the people doing this was doing it on purpose to attempt to discredit NLP by association. The people doing it did not answer that question.)

Not for that - I like Wikipedia, and generally find it reliable, and last time I looked the NLP article had been fairly much fixed. However, it had problems for a long while - I think at least a year. So, the process isn't perfect - real knowledge is needed. Fortunately, it seems to accumulate :)

Eivind.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[DragonWriter]

As pointed out elsewhere, the people who would participate are too self-selecting. They would just be too small a segment of the U.S. population.

And that would be different from the present US system how? You think substantive participation in the US political system isn't something done by a very small, largely self-selected (though wealth plays a big role in the capacity to "self-select") cadre of the population now?

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[locallyunscene]

There are other flaws as well. From my own participation, for example, I have found that often certain groups of people will "take over" a topic as "their own", and interfere with input from outside sources...
Wikipedia would be a disastrous model for anything having to do with government. It relies too much on the "good nature" of contributors.

How is this different from any government? I can think of instances of both these things within the American Republic. I would argue that Republicans have taken the national topic of "Family Values" even though different person's perceptions of what family values are can be radically different. Also we certainly rely on the "good nature" of our contributors now. As it stands those contributors are a smaller and less diverse section of the population so their effects are magnified rather than diminished by the majority.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[The One and Only]

As pointed out elsewhere, the people who would participate are too self-selecting. They would just be too small a segment of the U.S. population.

Good. I don't want my country run by people who have to be browbeaten into participating.

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[Jane Q. Public]

This ISN'T different from a large part of many governments today, which was exactly my point! Saying that they are "the same" doesn't negate the statement that it would still be a disastrous model.

Don't worry, it's just PR.

[Anonymous Coward]

A few nights ago the NZ police fatally gunned down an unarmed man.

They've also just been through yet another round of high-profile police rape trials which resulted in several cops/ex-cops going to jail for a long time.

Right now they can't really get any publicity worse than that.

Re:Populus, not populous

[I don't want to spen]

He just wants to be poplar...

Yeah cool

[rgaginol]

It's not quite the direct joint neural super entity out of Peter Hamiltons books (the one the Edenists have) but it's a step in the right direction.

Anyone got plans for a neural super entity... sign me up (well, maybe after they get past version 0.1;)

Can I contribute?

[OrangeTide]

I'm not from New Zealand, but I think with a name like "Police Act" that the law should roughly state: The beatings will continue until morale improves.

It's worth reading this rant on that popular joke slogan.

Re:Can I contribute?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's worth reading this rant on that popular joke slogan.

Just to point out to others that in fact it isn't worth reading at all. It took me about seven seconds to follow that link and read those two inane paragraphs. I'll never get that time back.

Re:Can I contribute?

[OrangeTide]

I don't agree with the rant. But it gives you a glimpse of the madness that is in other people's heads.

Re: Communism versus democracy

[TheSciBoy]

Exactly. It is understandable why people often gets these facts wrong since all (practically) communist governments in the world have been dictatorships in one form or another. But it must be noted that communism in itself does not exclude democracy. Democracy means that the majority rules. In the original democracies, not all people were allowed to vote (only the people who turned up for the meetings, excluding slaves and women, of course).

Democracy is often confused with a "fair" governmental systems because it is what most western countries have. But the fact of the matter is that China is a democracy. Of course there is only one party to vote for and all other parties are forbidden, but a democracy doesn't mean that it has to be fair. Many people have different opinions on what a democracy is, how it should be run and a democratic system is often unfair to the minority (which is the most difficult part of a democracy, how to activate those people who feel marginalised and make them feel like they are part of the system).

What the NZ government is doing is very interesting. The wiki obviously isn't supposed to be used for new laws, but it will probably be a very good source of interesting ideas for the government to ponder, a very democratic thing to do. In an ultimate democracy all people would vote for all decisions of government (of course this would be impossible and impractical since all people will neither have the time nor the inclanation to get the information needed to make informed decisions). This way you get the best of both worlds, anyone interested enough can speak up and those with the knowledge and position to make the changes can read ti and pick up good ideas. Very nice.

News Flash

[SpaghettiPattern]

News Flash
Last week all members of New Zealand Police force "on the beat" exclusively consisted of women, wearing erotic bras and thongs. It is believed this is related with the extreme democracy and an Internet phenomenon called the "Slashdot effect".

And now for the weather with Kiri...

Here is this citizen's input...

[patio11]

I don't care whether its the police or the Aqua Teen Hunger Force but somebody needs to do something about the elephants who keep trampling my sheep. You know their numbers have doubled in the last 6 months.

-- Not actually a New Zealand citizen, but I play one on Wiki

Awesome re-branding

[PhilHibbs]

Alternatively, it is proposed that all police forces throughout New Zealand be renamed "The New Zealand Yum-Yum Teddy Bear Strike Force Z"

You missed the real revert war...

[patio11]

... the talk page would be filled with the bloated corpses of editors who had died dueling about the proper spelling of "marijuana" and whether Anglicizing the word warranted the article being tagged as insensitive or having NPOV issues.

Re:Populus, not populous

[s13sr20det]

I think you'll find it's "populace".

We all hail the ...

[Camelot]

New Zealand Yum-Yum Teddy Bear Strike Force Z.

Extreme democracy at its finest.

Populace

[s13sr20det]

Fixed that for you: "New Zealand is now on the top of my list for cool governments. They've opened a wiki allowing the densely populated to craft a new version of their Police Act, the legislative basis for policing in New Zealand." I find that many New Zealanders are, in fact, densely populated people. Darned spell checkers, if only they could make up for moran grammer too.

Did you read the article summary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Shockingly, it's inaccurate... so go figure.

Re:citation needed - here it is -

[chris_sawtell]

A full account of what happened.

Unfortunately they withdrew the Tazers last month leaving the police with no alternative to using a pistol.

OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[Colin Smith]

What will the poor dears do? They have cigars to buy! Mercedes to pay for! Wars to organise.

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[Maelwryth]

Wars to organise? To quote one of our Prime Ministers, we are 'a dagger pointed at the heart of Antarctica'.

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[kiwipeso]

Re: your sig. As an Act supporter, I don't appreciate you implying there should be a separation of state and business. :-P

Back to topic though, could someone who has the damn password to this wiki please insert the following :

"Taking fingerprints or DNA without reason to suspect a crime has been committed is Orwellian, and police are therefore banned from doing so."

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[Maelwryth]

Re: Your comment. Yes, I imagine religion feels the same :).

Or, in relation to yesterdays shooting of a hammer wielding assailant;
"The decision to shoot is not a two second decision, you were holding the gun weren't you?"

offtopic
In regards to the "being in a public place means you have no right to privacy" comments being bandied around nowadays. As a thought experiment, how do you think a pleasant "OK then, please take your clothes off" would work? Is this not a situation where we have a right to privacy in a public place?
/offtopic

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[kiwipeso]

Well, the hammer wielding assailant was off his face on party pills. Trust me, it's not a good idea to be awake for more than 2 days straight. I should know, I've been awake seriously long amounts of time before. (But the less said about time spent with my ex, the better) ;-P

Most people would agree with you, except the nudists. But seriously, privacy is a natural process.

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[Maelwryth]

I would have to agree with you there, I stayed awake for three days as a teen to see what would happen. No drugs involved, I just wanted to know what happened. It would appear that at the three day mark my brain starts to buzz, I have mild visual hallucinations, and problems going to sleep :). I wish I had of had a webcam back then. I would have liked to see if I was taking "brain breaks" at that point.

Thanks for not talking about your ex. If she is really, really evil, I have probably already met her anyway :).

Privacy is a natural process? I don't think that will stop governments legislating it away.

Update on the wiki though. To quote, "The response so far has been better than expected and the Police Act Review Team would like to take some time to collate the submissions and suggestions made thus far. Thanks to all contributors." Not bad. It will be interesting to check up in a month to see what responses they got and what they will use. I wonder how all those people got passwords, and why we never saw any of the edits?

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[kiwipeso]

I can stay awake for 2 weeks if I don't have my pills. (Not a useful condition, unless you travel or have a lover ;-P )
It's only at the 9 days mark that I go fuzzy. I take minor brain breaks after then.
However, I have done it a couple of times and not revealed any research I'm doing, so I guess nobody can try to get information out of me by sleep deprivation.

That ex wasn't evil, she was just very bad for me, didn't want me to take my pills.

Ok, well I have trouble imagining that the state will get rid of anonymous political donations, for more than 1 election.
I really wanted to insert "The taking of DNA samples or fingerprints without reason to believe a crime has been committed is Orwellian, and the Police are therefore banned from doing so." along with this goody : "Children become criminally responsible at age 10." and "child criminals are banned from eating sweets until age 18."

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[Maelwryth]

That I would agree with, sugar should be far more maligned. Btw, do you know of any /. parties that are happening in the Auckland area for the anniversary?

Re:OH MY GOD! THINK OF THE POLITICIANS!

[kiwipeso]

Sorry, I don't know of any /. parties in Wellington, let alone Auckland. The few people I know IRL who might read /. don't.
I might find more /. readers at a new job I've applied for, but last party I had was "howling at lunar rossa" at my flat.

As for /. users, I would suggest that you will find a few at the university computer clubs or LUGs.

Can work in some cases, won't work in many

[Opportunist]

It does work in cases where people don't care. Sounds silly, I know, but that's how it is. It will only work for laws people don't feel strongly about. Or laws that only one side (pro or con) feels strongly about and the rest doesn't care.

Take the US and imagine a system like that. Now, take a law about subsidies for agriculture for example. Will it pass? Certainly. The farmers are the only ones who care about it. Do I care? No.

Now take a law about capital punishment, gay marriage or abortion. Then grab popcorn and watch the editwars.

If I was prime minister...

[ThirdPrize]

I think that where every 10/20 years the whole law book gets reviewed. Anything not entirely relevant gets removed so as to streamline the whole legal process. Most legal systems are full of laws that go back several hundred years and never get called on these days. If you don't see people herding sheep over london bridge its got nothing to do with the fact it's against the law, its just that there is no need to any more. Rather than the typical knee jerk reactions to some current event, a constantly evolving set of laws would be more in touch with the people and the state of the nation. To this end, a wiki is certainly an interesting way of doing things. A discussion forum on the various subjects may have been better as that would encourage proper discussion and discourage edit wars.

Re:If I was prime minister...

[TheRaven64]

How about imposing a word or page limit on the total volume of law? If you want to add some complexity to a part of the legal system, you have to remove some elsewhere.

Re:citation needed - here it is -

[Bitsy Boffin]

First. Tasers were not "withdrawn", the trial period ended and the results of said period are now being examined to determine if they should become a permanant fixture.

Second. NZ Police are supposed to be an unarmed force (although I believe certain situations allow an officer to carry, they are fairly rare). One can only assume that the victim was directly threatening the life another officer and so the shooter had time to retrieve a firearm from the patrol car where it was secured.

Third. This is all under investigation, both by police and the pca (police complaints authority), witness accounts don't paint a good picture for the police though so far.

Fourth. This is completely off topic.

Not Communism, It's called Populism

[Anonymous Coward]

Look it up

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populism

Re:Not Communism, It's called Populism

[Verte]

Populism is a system of rule with a primary interest in the people, though it does not describe means. Arguably, this makes all democracies populist. It runs tangent to everyone being able to have influence on government, but they are not equivalent. For example, businesses could have input to open fora on public policy [populism does not contain common rule], or a government could push agenda that is popular on the surface, but people do not know about since there is no open forum [common rule does not contain populism].

In Russia...

[Tjeerd]

...the police writes the law for you. (once in your life you have to make this joke on /.)

Re:Populus, not populous

[mykdavies]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populace

Nothing cool about our government

[kiwipeso]

I agree, I live in wellington. There is yet, nothing cool about using a wiki for our overdue update to the police act.
This is just an extra piece of fluff to go with the announcement of the new cyber-crime lab.
I wonder, did they also use green matrices and smoke effects to herald this new initiative?

However, if this is the start to allow citizens to write their opinions on forthcoming and existing laws, I'm in favor.

Re:Nothing cool about our government

[mdwh2]

However, if this is the start to allow citizens to write their opinions on forthcoming and existing laws, I'm in favor.

Here in the UK, the Government lets citizens write their opinions through "consultations" (either submitting to an email address, or an online forum).

However, the problem is the Government then ignores anything said. Or rather, when people reply in support, it claims it's doing what people want; when people criticise, it ignores them and still claims it's doing what people want.

Re:Nothing cool about our government

[Ajehals]

Not quite true, I have had responses and clarifications on all the questions I have asked of the government, I have had emails indicating that the government will or has taken additional action regarding something that I and others obviously were concerned about (independent midwifery as it happens). I am happy with that, I don't expect to fill out an on-line form and then receive an apology from the home secretary as well as my requested changes to legislation. I would rather prefer that the government listen, but still have the courage to do what is best for the country regardless of the objections. We do elect our MP's so that they can make decisions on our behalf, it is counter productive to second guess them at every juncture, or expect them to do the most popular thing. What they should be doing is taking difficult decisions, representing our interests and ensuring that the country's best interests are met. I'd hate to live in a country where legislation is passed on the basis of what the red tops had on their front pages that week.

Re:Nothing cool about our government

[Proofof. Chaos]

Here in the US, we have had a system that allows the public to write the law for decades, at least at the state and local level. In some states they are called propositions, and in some, issues. If enough people (with the help of a special interest group, of course) can get enough signatures, they can get an issue on the ballot to be voted on. These issues are almost a way for the majority to impose their will upon a minority group. Often, it will be some kind of tax upon a minority group, which will reduce the tax burden on the majority. Or, it will be some sort of restriction on what people can do on their own property, because the majority of their neighbors don't like it.

If you have a pet peeve that the legislature won't touch because they don't want to piss off a large portion of their electorate, or because it is outside of the scope of their power, just get it on the ballot and get more people to vote for it than against it.

In New Zealand...

[Aokubidaikon]

The Kiwi writes you.
Oh, wait...

Be wise to manufactured bogeymen

[Morgaine]

> OK, it's unrealistic to believe that New Zealand would let anyone write the law. That would lead to anarchy.

You've been reading too much government propaganda.

"Anarchy" is a bogeyman that governments trot out whenever there's a danger that citizens want to control their politicians and make them servants of the people, which of course would never do.

It ranks alongside "Who will think of the children?", manufactured wars, and dozens of other diversionary tactics that they use.

Be wise to manufactured bogeymen.

The USA tried this once

[bl8n8r]

I think I have the draft here somewhere .... *rummage*.. ah, yes here it is.

http://www.archives.gov/national-archives-experience/charters/constitution.html

The only drawback is every few hundred years you need a lot of bloodshed so
people remember why it was started and what it means. It would help immensely
if they would let kids know about this in school.

all pages are password protected

[Errtu76]

I tried to make a new law by creating a new article and it prompted me for a password.

From the PmWiki manual: By default, PmWiki is configured with empty @@read@@ and @@edit@@ passwords for the whole site (allowing anyone to view or edit pages).

So i guess they just set a password. Would be the best thing, i guess. Especially after the entire /. community found out about the site.

Those new laws in full - to save time

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Do not talk about /b/
2. DO NOT talk about /b/
3. We are Anonymous
4. Anonymous is legion
5. Anonymous never forgives
6. Anonymous can be horrible, senseless, uncaring monster
7. Anonymous is still able to deliver
8. There are no real rules about posting
9. There are no real rules about moderation either - enjoy your ban
10. If you enjoy any rival sites - DON'T
11. All your carefully picked arguments can easily be ignored
12. Anything you say can and will be used aganist you
13. Anything you say can and will be turned into something else - fixed
14. Do not argue with trolls - it means that they win
15. The harder you try the harder you will fail
16. If you fail in epic proportions, it may just become a winning failure
17. Every win fails eventually
18. Everything that can be labeled can be hated
19. The more you hate it the stronger it gets
20. Nothing is to be taken seriously
21. Original content is original only for a few seconds before getting old
22. Copypasta is made to ruin every last bit of originality
23. Copypasta is made to ruin every last bit of originality
24. Every repost is always a repost of a repost
25. Relation to the original topic decreases with every single post
26. Any topic can be easily turned into something totally unrelated
27. Always question a person's sexual preferences without any real reason
28. Always question a person's gender - just in case it's really a man
29. In the internet all girls are men and all kids are undercover FBI agents
30. There are no girls on the internet
31. TITS or GTFO - the choice is yours
32. You must have pictrues to prove your statement
33. Lurk more - it's never enough
34. There is porn of it, no exceptions
35. If no porn is found at the moment, it will be made
36. There will always be more fucked up shit than you just saw
37. You can not divide by zero (just because the calculator says so)
38. No real limits of any kind apply here - not even the sky
39. CAPSLOCK IS CRUISE CONTROL FOR COOL
40. EVEN WITH CRUISE CONTROL YOU STILL HAVE TO STEER
41. Desu isn't funny. Seriously guys. It's worse than Chuck Norris jokes
42. Nothing is Sacred.
43. The more beautiful and pure a thing is - the more satisfying it is to corrupt it
44. Even one positive comment about Japanese things can make you a weeaboo
45. When one sees a lion, one must get into the car
46. There is always furry porn of it
47. The pool is always closed
48. Do Not turn your back on Anonymous. Do not Betray Anonymous. Anonymous does not forget and neither should you. What Anonymous gives, Anonymous can take away. We control everything.
49. Tim is always behind you...ALWAYS.

The Rules

You don't think

[Anonymous Coward]

that maybe the libraries have internet access?

Simply put, this is MOB Rule

[MrHyd3]

Mob Rules eh? Look out you minority thinking people, they will change laws to marginalize you and then write a law to youthenize you.....A Democratic REPUBLIC is the only way to go.

Re:Simply put, this is MOB Rule

[tepples]

Mob Rules eh? But it might be better than rule by the other mob (and foreign counterparts).

Imagine what a script kiddie would do with this

[chord.wav]

Police will not be allowed to confiscate computers in any case.
Police will not be able not arrest people under 15.
_-_= 4LL Y0UR L4w5 B3L0ng TO US!!!! =_-_
---=== Sh0UTZ To: Kad0rna - M1lk0 and my L33t cr3w ===---

Duverger's law

[tepples]

(I can't really understand how the US ended up with only two parties; overhere we have at least five, and in that handfull of parties I don't find a complete match with my views.) Duverger's law: Plurality voting gives an advantage to two parties.

Vote no confidence?

[tepples]

But the fact of the matter is that China is a democracy. Of course there is only one party to vote for and all other parties are forbidden Is it possible for Chinese people to vote no confidence in the ruling party?

Re:Vote no confidence?

[TheSciBoy]

Is it possible for Chinese people to vote no confidence in the ruling party?

Possibly, but who would they be replaced with? :-P

Let me clarify that I'm not an advocate of the Chinese government and make it clear that I don't think they are actually democratic. What I'm saying is that the democracy that Plato once laid down the rules for looks very different from our modern day definition and that there are many totalitarian regimes in the world that claim to be democratic. See the wikipedia page about democracy for a more in depth analysis of this.

Re:Populace

[Anonymous Coward]

"if only they could make up for moran grammer too."

Maybe you should start with the spell checker and move on from there...

NZ

[KiwiCanuck]

New Zealand should be at the top of every1's cool list.

Legalize dope

[athloi]

http://wiki.policeact.govt.nz/pmwiki.php/MarijuanaLegalization/MarijuanaLegalization?action=edit When the 400,000th edit to this page must be reverted, they'll see why this was a Bad Idea.

Re:Legalize dope

[Anonymous Coward]

They should be using Metascore, and there wouldn't be any revert wars.

Of course... someone needs to write Metascore first, but that's "just an engineering problem." Word is, Metascore is now being developed as an extension to Vanilla.

...and now to go the rest of the way

[Anonymous Coward]

This is just a first step in the direction of implementing the Metagovernment, and open source governance project aimed at replacing every single government in the world.

With great power comes great responsibility

[alexo]

Here's a suggestion:

Police are sanctioned by the state to use force, sometimes even lethal force, whereas regular citizens are prevented from doing so in most circumstances.
Therefore, police should be more accountable and held to higher standards than the rest of the citizenry.
And yes, that includes stiffer penalties in case they screw up.

Australia

[Nimey]

Isn't NZ part of Australia? What does your real government have to say?

gd&r

Re:Australia

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't Canada part of USA? What does your real goverment have to say?

Re:Australia

[Nimey]

"Calm down and be nice, eh?"

Why is this a good idea?

[Nukenbar]

Would you want to work in a skyscraper designed by the fools of the internet, or maybe engineers?

I have no problem with public comment and input, but why don't we leave the law writing to the lawyers.

Sloppy Blowjobs For Everyone!

[Anonymous Coward]

Aahhhh, the joys of a wiki....

------

http://wiki.policeact.govt.nz/pmwiki.php/PolicingAct2008/CommissionerToActAsGoodEmployer

------

"Subject to this Act, the Commissioner must operate a personnel policy that complies with the principle of being a good employer, in line with the provisions of sections 56 and 58 of the State Sector Act 1988. Under these provisions, the commissioner is required to, but not limited to, provide sloppy blowjobs for all New Zealand-employed officers of the law."

Re:Populace

[Anonymous Coward]

*whoosh*

NZ Public Regulation Nr 001

[PPH]

PPH gets half of everything.

Way better than wiki!

[Anonymous Coward]

Awesome idea. Instead of a wiki that anyone can edit (read: vandalize), they propose a user ranking system.

I'll be interested to see how this pans out.

Re:Way better than wiki!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but then you don't get the free sloppy blowjobs (see post below).

Government != Police

[Anonymous Coward]

Government and police should be two separate things. The government make the laws and negotiates a budget with the police. The police enforces the law. No government should be able to tell the police what to do.

As I understand it, the wiki is created by the police and not the government, unless they have a different kind of "democracy" down there.

The most essential part of a democracy is the tripartition of power. The legislative, the executive and the judicial powers.

In some european countries the drinking age...

[Nursie]

...IS around 13. These are noticeably not the countries with massive alcohol problems. The age of 21 is crazy...

Nothing wrong with turtlenecks.

[Shag]

The phrase "sweater meat" does not exist without reason, sir.

great

[just_asgard]

great! may be in near future we'll see an open society structure and all lows will be edited by community via wiki. =)

Citation given!

[lennier]

'Us cops don't get paid enough to go home in a box'

My city, two nights ago. First police shooting in three years. The dead guy didn't have a gun.

Re:Citation given!

[Rupert]

Yes, but he had a hammer. Someone probably shouted "drop the hammer!" and that's what the policeman did.

ABOLISH THE POLICE

[Anonymous Coward]

Sweep away the power of the bourgeoisie with world socialist revolution!

Forge an authentic Leninist-Trotskyist workers party and a reborn Fourth International!

but in Soviet Russia...

[largesnike]

the laws write YOU!

Leagalise "Sheep love"

[guru_Stew]

I'm quite sure this is simply a way to legalize sexual relations with sheep. Politicians couldn't be seen to propose this, but left open to the general population of NZ it'll find it's way in there.

And tucked away in a tiny little unlinked corner -

[Geminii]

"None of these laws apply to Bob."

Re:Populus, not populous

[kiwipeso]

Hmm, does that mean Ohakune is the town that belongs to Evil? Lol, that'd suck. They have relatively cheap skiing there.
I'll be stuffed if I need to go all the way to the South Island to ski.