Talk:Law of New Zealand

Small Claims Court
Sadly there's no mention of the New Zealand small claims tribunal either here, or on the page about Small claims court generally. And here's me looking for (e.g) what the limits are for it... Karora 07:30, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Looks like this would be a good starting reference: Karora 07:58, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Feel free to add this stuff in yourself... --Helenalex (talk) 08:52, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Unstructured references with bundled citations in the lead section
Whats up with the 28 unstructured references containing multiple bundled citations in the lead section? Cited this way, none of the references can be easily reused to support the content in the rest of the document. I think bundling citations in this way is unwise. Citations should support individual statements in the body, not individual words in the lead section. If somebody modifies the list in the second paragraph of the lead section, all the (almost unreadable) references associated will each word will probably disappear because it is not apparent what statements they are supporting. Please remember that Wikipedia is not a link farm. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 04:27, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * The lists of sources in the footnotes are absolutely necessary to provide a list of further reading to facilitate the expansion of this article, and to facilitate the creation of missing articles (basically more or less the whole subject is missing eg Statutory interpretation in New Zealand, Law of evidence in New Zealand and so on down the list). The list of sources does not violate WP:LINKFARM. If you can think of a better way of organising the material without removing reliable sources from the encyclopedia, please do so. James500 (talk) 05:07, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * @User:James500: You haven't answered my question: Why bundle these citations? Also, I am saying the citations are unstructured, meaning they do not use a citation template, which make it difficult to unbundle them and move them around. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 09:24, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Branches of law in the lead section
The second paragraph of the lead section is a list that is not expanded upon in any significant way in the body of the article. The way it is presented the list and its monolithic load of bundled citations acts as an inhibitor for writing a better article. Depending on how you divide up the law, there are Public Acts, Local Acts and Private Acts passed by Parliament, which is a legislative view. Or there is Constitutional law - which which is primarily concerned with the powers needed to govern and make the law; Criminal law - which is primarily concerned with crime and sanctioning offenders; Civil law - which is mostly about regulating people's relationships with each other; Administrative law - which is mostly about empowering and regulating the bureaucracy and government; as well as Common law - which is the law made by the Courts and Judges deciding individual cases. I think the list in the lead section should not be cited in this way as it becomes little more than a link farm. At present, it difficult to see what statements or claims might be supported by these citations because this list of word has little or no structure or hierarchy. Placing the citation against each word suggests the citations are merely justifying list membership. To avoid all the references there being lost, each branch or category identified by the listed words needs to appear in some form of hierarchy in the body of the article, rather than as a summary word list in the lead section. In this way the references can be cited to support individual statement. At present the list of words in the lead section are not helpful in informing readers or giving one any insights about the article subject. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 05:06, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * The list does not inhibit the expansion of this article in any way. The list is the only thing in this article that might actually stimulate a significant expansion of this article, since it gives the only indication of what sections are presently missing from the article. If you want to dismantle the list, the logical solution would be to add the missing sections. James500 (talk) 05:22, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * All the recently Google Books links that I have checked so far have failed verification because these URLs take me to a Google Books web page for the book or journal, rather than the cited article. I understand that Google Books is an e-commerce website. while the journal citations may be valid the Google Books URLs are not reliable, at least for me. I think citing a Google Books link that does not lead to the cited article page is misleading as the content is not freely available. A citation without the faulty URL might be better, in my opinion, at least then I would know to go to a law library and find the printed journal. At the moment, an editor might discount all your citations because the content cannot be accessed. Current consensus seems to be it is OK to link to the Google Books pages where a preview is available, but not OK just to link to the book or journal, which is why I say it is like a link farm. Personally, I don't want to dismantle the list, I am merely observing that if somebody else does then all the references will go. Putting the references in the lead like this is intimidating as it looks like the rest of the article has been finalised, when it obviously hasn't. It would be better if these citations were placed in a resources section that needs further development in the future. Especially if you have no intention of adding content to expand the article based on the sources you have cited. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 09:08, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * That guideline says "Page links should only be added when the book is available for preview; they will not work with snippet view" (my emphasis). The guideline is only talking about page links. It says nothing about linking to the whole volume or scan. A "page link" means a link that includes something like "&pg=PA1". James500 (talk) 09:29, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

How to use snippet view
@User:Cameron Dewe: Regarding this edit: All you have to do is put the title of the article into the search engine and it immediately verifies that it exists, like this: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=hucxAQAAIAAJ&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=%22classification+of+trusts%22. James500 (talk) 08:50, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * @User:James500: Linking to Google Books pages via snippet view only verifies the article exists, it does not allow me to read the cited content and verify what you are saying is accurate, which is the whole point of citations. Otherwise it is not worth having the link. I am getting very tempted at removing the Google Books links in your citations if it only permits me to see a snippet and not the whole article. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 09:34, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * In all fairness, you can read cited content in snippet view. For example, if you seach for followed by  followed by  and so on, you can read it. James500 (talk) 09:55, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * You may know know to do this. I could probably learn how to do this. But expecting users to understand why they have to do this just to read a cited article is counter-intuitive. Anyway, you should be citing the snipped view URL that points to the article, not the Google Books URL that ends at the journal or the book. Being unable to read more than a snippet of content at a time does not really help an article to be written. Personally, I would rather write the article first and add the citations later, rather than the other way around. Beside it makes it difficult to mine the source, nor does it aid creating an understandable article. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 11:03, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * When I added this material, I was expecting to fully expand this article and write a number of new articles on New Zealand law more or less immediately. Unfortunately, I have not had time to do either; and I do not have time to do either, or to participate in a discussion like this one, at the moment. Therefore I suggest that the material be altogether removed from the article without prejudice. James500 (talk) 13:31, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * ✅ with this edit and this edit. I am no longer prepared to participate in this article or its talk page, so anyone who wants to restore the material will have to do so themselves. James500 (talk) 06:39, 22 February 2021 (UTC)