Open Journal Systems at the Victoria University of Wellington Library
Not a member yet
6045 research outputs found
Sort by
What is the civics and media project?
Get PDFThe Civics and Media Project examined the following question: How do we ensure we have a well-informed and civically engaged population in 2030? Convened by Victoria University of Wellington, the University of Auckland, NZ On Air, the Royal Society of New Zealand, the McGuinness Institute and the Ministry for Culture and Heritage, three workshops were held in Auckland and Wellington in late 2015. Participants represented media, government, academia, education and the wider community. 
A Reform Architecture for Political Party Funding in Aotearoa New Zealand
Get PDFWe recently published a comprehensive report on political party funding in Aotearoa New Zealand (Rashbrooke and Marriott, 2022). This article documents some of the issues we discovered in the process of writing that report and some of the solutions we propose to address these issues. We recommend stronger donation regulation: capping annual donations at 1,500. We also recommend increased state funding: for approximately $2 per voter per annum, ‘big money’ can be eliminated from the political finance arena. This improves transparency and – crucially – can significantly reduce the perception of influence from large donations
Interpreting mereotopological connection
Get PDFThis paper examines ten possible topological interpretations of connection and for each interpretation, identifies sufficient conditions under which a significant class of topological spaces provides models of General Extensional Mereotopology with Closure Conditions (GEMTC) in which some key mereotopological ideas align with their topological analogues. In particular, there is an interpretation under which the non-empty sets of any symmetric topology are a model of GEMTC with alignment between the mereotopological and topological definitions of (self-)connection, open and closed entities, interior, exterior, closure, and boundary
CouncilMARK™ Revisited: measuring the effectiveness of New Zealand’s local government once more
No full textThis article reviews the results of the second tranche of assessments for CouncilMARK™ , Local Government New Zealand’s voluntary quality enhancement programme. Those councils that were reassessed generally showed either a modest improvement or no change in the four priority areas assessed (governance, financial decision making, service delivery and communication). The business and corporate focus of CouncilMARK means that it yields scores that diverge markedly from those obtained by the New Zealand Local Government Survey, which focuses on public and business perceptions of council activities. The implementation of CouncilMARK has not arrested the decline of voter turnout in local body elections. Moreover, there have been no changes to either the programme’s priority areas or its procedures that recognise recent local and international research which consistently advocates a more people-focused approach to the activities of local government
The Return of Tūtaepatu Lagoon
Get PDFTūtaepatu lagoon has been an important Ngāi Tahu mahinga kai/food gathering site for over 300 years. Following the formal colonisation that began in 1840, Ngāi Tahu meant to reserve the lagoon from the 1848 Kemp’s Deed purchase but this was not done. This article sets out the ways in which control of this mahinga kai was wrested from the control of Ngāi Tūāhuriri hapū in the mid-nineteenth century and managed by Pākehā local and central government authorities throughout the twentieth century until it was finally returned as a part of the Ngāi Tahu Treaty settlement in the 1990s. The importance of political power at both the local and central government level was fundamental to its eventual return.
Integrated Power-Line and Visible-Light Communications
Get PDFThe current state of the world places an important role on communication, specifically the different mediums for communication and how we can exploit them. The issue with such mediums is that very often, there are clear disadvantages that cause them to become less viable in certain conditions. For this project, an existing VLC (Visible Light Communication) device has shown to produce high speed communications across an unblocked path of visible light. The motivation for this project stems from the fact that although a VLC device has clear advantages such as a lack of consideration of frequency bands, non-licensed communication and a lack of interruption from other sources, there are clear disadvantages as well. Specifically, the datastream is extremely sensitive to external light sources, and a direct line of unblocked site is required for communication. This project calls for an addition to be made in the form of a PLC (powerline communication) device to act as a complementary form of communication. PLC devices do not have the advantages of license and band free communication. However, they are resilient to light interference, and can operate in any conditions with a mains line by modulating, injecting, and demodulating data over said mains. This report details the development and more importantly results of the project, displaying data on several metrics of the filter system, as well as an emphasis on the development process and results of the PCB and device itself. Shortcomings and alternative results of the project are also discussed in place of metrics and results in the cases that said metrics and results could not be achieved or measured
Development of an Agency Partner Portal for RescueMetrics
Get PDFIn response to the evolving needs of agency partners and the dynamic digital landscape, this project seeks to transform the user experience within the RescueMetrics web-application by introducing a comprehensive set of new features and pages. The project implemented a new onboarding flow, created an overview one-stop-shop dashboard for aggregated data insights, enabled rebate payment tracking, and implemented account permissions along with brand transfer functionality
AR Sandbox Built Within Unreal Engine 5
Get PDFAugmented Reality (AR) is increasingly recognised as a transformative interface for combining the physical and virtual worlds, thereby elevating user engagement and comprehension of learning topics. This project leverages this capacity through a projection-based AR setup that incorporates a Kinect V2 sensor, a projector, and a box of sand to forge an interactive sandbox environment. In this setup, real-time manipulations inside the physical sandbox have a direct impact on a digitally rendered visualisation that is then projected onto the sand bed. The defining accomplishment of this project is the porting of sandbox software that ran on an outdated OpenFrameworks v0.9.8 to the state-of-the-art Unreal Engine 5 platform. This technological leap accomplishes two objectives: it updates the application with modern visual capabilities and enhances its scalability and overall performance. The transition grants access to a range of advanced graphical features, debugging tools, and an extensive developer community supportive of Unreal Engine 5. Consequently, this means the project has been freed from the maintenance hurdles that were associated with previous attempts to update the OpenFrameworks system to newer versions. This change opens the door for virtually endless possibilities of further features and improvements. With the switch to Unreal Engine 5, the project now has huge potential for innovative changes that could reshape how we interact with the augmented reality sandbox
The Family Court – Contempt and Inherent Powers
Get PDFThis article honours the achievements of Professor ATH Smith both in New Zealand and abroad. Its focus is on aspects of the New Zealand Family Court. The law of contempt is now governed by the Contempt of Court Act 2019. The earlier leading case on the contempt powers of the Family Court is analysed, followed by the changes made by the 2019 Act and their implications for the Court. The discussion is on the basis that the Family Court does not have inherent powers to deal with contempt situations not covered by the statutory scheme. As a part of the District Court, its inherent powers are limited to matters of procedure: contempt is a substantive matter, not one of procedure. The article concludes by briefly raising the wider question of whether the distinction between the senior courts and the lower ones, such as the Family Court, is helpful
Life as a Kiwi at the English Bar
Get PDFIn honour of Professor Smith's status as a member of the English bar, this article provides an insight into life at the English bar from the perspective of a New Zealander who has practised in England as a barrister for over 20 years. The author describes how the English bar and barristers' chambers operate, and her own path to becoming a King's Counsel, including some of her most memorable cases. The author graduated from Victoria University of Wellington in the mid-1990s with a BA and LLB(Hons), and was awarded the Chapman Tripp Sheffield Young prize for the top law graduate in her year. After completing the LLM at the University of Cambridge (and gaining the highest mark in her year), she worked for two years as a solicitor at Clifford Chance in London before transferring to the bar, where she has practised from Blackstone Chambers ever since. This article is an adaptation of a lecture given at the Victoria University of Wellington Faculty of Law in September 2022
Access Repository Dashboard
Do you manage Open Journal Systems at the Victoria University of Wellington Library? Access insider analytics, issue reports and manage access to outputs from your repository in the CORE Repository Dashboard!