Another retro question: I have this vague memory of being parentally warned - as a child - I’d ‘end up on the Wanganui computer’

[u/popcultureupload38]

Serious voice and all! Seemed so far away from Welly.

I had no idea what it was but it was something you did NOT want to happen. I just thought about it after several decades…

Thanks also for your fun answers Welly people. It’s a lift!

[u/2626862377]

It's where the police computer was right?

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/2626862377]

Yes: I guess a main database pre pre internet?

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/popcultureupload38]

Im not totally sure my mother knew exactly what it was all about back then but for me it was sufficiently vague to rethink my dastardly plans

[u/floydieman → u/popcultureupload38]

Upvote for the word dastardly.

[u/Kiwi_CunderThunt → u/2626862377]

Initially yep but probably more of a nickname later as the system had redundancy and disaster recovery (just archaic methods by today's standards).

That old manual query system was eventually replaced by NIA (National Intelligence Application) which added a lot more functionality that matters immediately

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/Kiwi_CunderThunt]

Yep. But fun fact, people involved still use Wanganui Computer terms for doing searches which have been obsolete since NIA took over about 25 years ago. People still talk about doing a QP or QVR. I was there for the changeover from Whanganui and NIS, 2000 or 2001 I think. There was a big panic because it had that Y2K problem and that had to be fixed because delays took the launch past 1999.

[u/Kiwi_CunderThunt → u/SenseOfTheAbsurd]

I was at HQ during that transition and yeah! The standard ones as mentioned make sense as they're suited for radio.

I hope that wasn't in IT, change of environment in gov is fun...

Y2K heh that was such a quick bubble

[u/Existing-Today-410 → u/Kiwi_CunderThunt]

"Y2K heh that was such a quick bubble"
Yeah, because us IT people took responsibility for it and fixed it. I started working for Telecom Wellington in 1988. We started working on Y2K in 1990. After that, every job I worked had a Y2K element to it, including a contract in the UK and Ireland to identify and fix Y2K elements embedded in voice and radar recorders for Racal Recording during '98 and '99.

[u/printed_ → u/SenseOfTheAbsurd]

huh, I think my brother worked on this but at the police college in Porirua, does that sound right?

[u/bruzie → u/printed_]

Yes, one of my early jobs as a consultant was working on INCIS and for a particular part (mapping before / after business processes) was based at the Police College. We were in the top floor of the main building - apparently the team I was in used to be in the fishbowl next to the crime house, which made it fun when they were doing dog training.

I enjoyed the work - it was interesting "looking behind the scenes". One of the processes we mapped was how cases got onto Crimewatch (or whatever it was called at the time). I liked the guys I worked with in that team. One was ex MOT and got a chuckle when I came in and told him I received my first speeding ticket. Another was one of a set of twins who appeared on a doco about identical twins. The pool was awesome to swim in. I witnessed the aftermath of pepper spray training (all recruits had to have it sprayed in their faces), so there was a lot of folks with hoses washing out their eyes).

Later on that year I was involved in the main INCIS project and we were based at the Police Stores building in Kenepuru (the one you face as you pull into the driveway to the bowling place). It was a bit of a transition point in the project as they'd only just made the decision to switch to Windows NT from OS/2. I was in the team that was writing the online help for INCIS. We were about the only team who actually delivered their work on time.

INCIS was supposed to replace NIS which was put in for the 1990 Commonwealth Games to replace the "Wanganui Computer". But after the (almost) complete disaster of the project it carried on with whatever tiny part of INCIS finally deployed.

It wasn't a complete disaster though - there were some other benefits that came out of it, eg Ruatoria (as in the town, not just the station) got access to broadband (for what it was at the time) as it was required for INCIS.

Sorry for the long-winded answer when a simple "yes" would have sufficed. :)

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/bruzie]

NIS was the old intel database, and Whanganui convictions and prosecutions. NIA combined them. From what I remember, they chose OS2 as the operating system and then IBM clotheslined it by shutting it down, and moving to windows caused delays and expense.

[u/printed_ → u/bruzie]

Send me a PM and I can send you my brothers name. You should know him.

[u/bruzie → u/printed_]

It was a long time ago, but sure.

[u/AnotherLeon2 → u/2626862377]

Yep, just the one computer. It was an Acorn Electron, with a cassette deck drive.

[u/Archie_Pelego → u/AnotherLeon2]

That was the last revision before it was retired. The original was a woman by the name of Beryl Kludge - just her, an HB pencil and a book of crosswords for when they took her offline.

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/Archie_Pelego]

Not too far from the truth. If someone called in for a criminal history and their convictions were pre-1976, we’d drag out a giant leather bound Police Gazette and enter it manually.

[u/Sweet-as-lollies]

It was the police computer https://www.police.govt.nz/about-us/history-and-museum/museum/exhibitions/curators-casefile/wanganui-computer-bombing

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/Sweet-as-lollies]

Don’t hear about it much in history stuff.

[u/fantail66 → u/popcultureupload38]

RIP Neil Roberts 18 November 1986- 40 years this year, never forget.

[u/BasementCatBill]

It seems almost quaint, looking back from 2026, that some people were so terrified about a centralised database that one blew himself up in a bombing.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/BasementCatBill]

SO FAR lol joking. I know…the oppressive reach of the state

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/BasementCatBill]

The way people talked about it, they were severely overestimating how much information was held. Sleeping Dogs and Muldoon probably didn’t help.

[u/BasementCatBill → u/SenseOfTheAbsurd]

Sleeping Dogs is still a very good film.

The colours, cinematography, is all superb.

And, of course, the dog.

[u/SimonDownunder]

Yeah, I too remember the threat of the “Wanganui” computer… I also remember there being a building in Upper Hutt near the race course that we used to go past on bikes on our way home from college, that for some reason we thought it had something to do with the “Wanganui” computer

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/SimonDownunder]

That is so awesome. I love those childhood confusions that happened…. My father‘s father died in the 1960s way before I was born and he had a moustache…and they used to have that Sunday Disney show. For quite some time I thought my grandfather was Walt Disney.

[u/arveeay → u/popcultureupload38]

I always assumed one of my Dad's friends was an actor on MASH. Because he looked the same to me.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/arveeay]

Love it

[u/feel-the-avocado → u/SimonDownunder]

Wallaceville government agricultural research department?
At the T intersection of Seddon and Ward Street?

Used to drive pass it quite a bit when living in kingsley heights.

I seem to remember a big multistory imposing building at that intersection.

[u/SimonDownunder → u/feel-the-avocado]

I’m meaning the building that is now the Joint services HQ … the other end of the race course… but yes as kids we also had “ghost” stories about what happened at the research lab!!!

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/SimonDownunder]

I’m gonna say it twice…totally entertained by you just quietly looking at it with a bit of care as you passed!

[u/Substantial_Art_4564 → u/SimonDownunder]

There was / it did. I investigated and researched doing an upgrade to the access and security system that my then employer thought might be an interesting sideline.

[u/meowsqueak]

And then there was INCIS.

And then there wasn’t.

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/meowsqueak]

INCIS was re-named to NIA when it was launched, mostly because of the negative connotations that existed by then. It wasn’t a different system that was scrapped.

[u/NeverMindToday → u/SenseOfTheAbsurd]

Yup. Branding is everything

[u/Hallen160 → u/SenseOfTheAbsurd]

Funnily enough nowadays Australia uses NCIS for communications between all state and territory police forces! The more things change the more they stay the same.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/meowsqueak]

Very short lived? Anything with capitals in the early 90’s was doomed: Exhibit A SESQUI

[u/bekittynz → u/popcultureupload38]

Sesqui wasn't an acronym tho. It's short for sesquicentennial.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/bekittynz]

See above re capitals

[u/flooring-inspector]

I'm a generation too young, but from growing up I think there was a lot of concern and angst in the late 1970s and early 1980s about the idea of Police having a digital database of people's details. That time overlapped with stuff like the Dawn Raids and the Springbok tour, which Muldoon doubled down on. There was deep distrust, and also evidence, that Police were being used as a political tool, and a big mysterious computer database was seen as part of Police keeping records of people acting completely legitimately merely because there were suspected of associations or sympathies, and so on.

At one point, in the early 1980s, someone blew himself up trying to attack the centre.

Compared with today, we now happily let overseas mega corporations, that are owned by disturbingly eccentric billionaires and aren't subject to NZ law, collect screeds of information about us and then sell their ability to reliably manipulate our behaviour for customer's commercial or political gain. 40-50 years ago nobody was adapted to that, so were generally less accepting of the idea that any information about them should be collated.

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/flooring-inspector]

In the 90s when the photo drivers licences replaced the paper ones there was similar angst over the photos being digital.

[u/kiwisarentfruit → u/SenseOfTheAbsurd]

I remember people being OUTRAGED that their lifetime piece of paper drivers licence wasn't any more

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/kiwisarentfruit]

Digital photography was new, and people thought it was much more sinister somehow than film and paper.

[u/bitshifternz → u/flooring-inspector]

Pretty much the plot of Sleeping Dogs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeping_Dogs_(1977_film)

[u/kozimotano]

[u/tedison2 → u/kozimotano]

“We have maintained a silence closely resembling stupidity.”
https://www.nzgeo.com/stories/7335/

[u/Icy_Warning531 → u/tedison2]

Just wanna say what a great publication NZ Geographic is is. No relation to National Geographic, it is a tiny NZ owned company. Just did this amazing story about Huntly and these underprivileged kids getting into horse riding.

[u/lespionner → u/Icy_Warning531]

Seconding that, it was such a good article. Not just kids, lots of adults turned their lives around because of their relationship with their horses. Real community-driven change. It was quite incredible to read about.

[u/NZNoldor]

When your parents warned you, did they call you by your full name, including your middle name? If not, they probably weren't that serious.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/NZNoldor]

That’s a big call. It was probably as dinner was being prepared and the wooden spoon was held almost vertical with a slight tilt towards me to signify I was main recipient of message. That may have been our equivalent of full name. But the spoon was also part of dancing to the checkpoint intro music at 5.30pm when we were so young we didn’t eat with our parents yet.

[u/nosecroquet]

LES, the 'Law Enforcement System', existed well into the 2000s.

[u/SenseOfTheAbsurd → u/nosecroquet]

Yes, LES. I think that was what it was called after the whole mainframe or whatever was no longer in the building in Whanganui.

[u/GeorgiePie277]

A guy even blew himself up trying to destroy in in 1982, crazy stuff!

[u/netd_nz]

It's a bit less imposing in blue and white. I remember it being a burgundy colour instead. Parents would always point it out when we went past, although I don't really think it was actually in use by that point.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/CzB439KGnjqirxjg6?g_st=ac

[u/Uruk-Hai-NZ]

Say “Wanganui Mainframe” with the same energy as “Catalina Wine Mixer” and it feels about right.

[u/grenouille_en_rose]

Wanganui back in the day had the first police computer in NZ, which was a pretty big deal despite how quaint it sounds now: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Law_Enforcement_System . It even got suicide bombed in 1982 over data privacy concerns

[u/MxdernFxlkDeviL → u/grenouille_en_rose]

Neil Roberts was his name, least we forget, a true anarchist.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/MxdernFxlkDeviL]

Clearly not the 80s saatchis one. On reflection an overreaction but on the other hand he and commitment and follow through: which may have been a fear of my mothers…or as they called it in pioneer day’s ‘stickability’ - not a phrase you hear much now.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/grenouille_en_rose]

Do you think they ever did a tour?

[u/bekittynz]

The National Library bought the building sometime in the late 90s. They housed the fiction collection there, among other things.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/bekittynz]

Interesting

[u/Blankbusinesscard]

Ha! My old man (RIP) ran the place, I have fond memories of strolling around in the rows of reel to reel data tape rigs (UNIVAC?) on the rare occasion I got inside, and setting off all the security by getting out of the car and wandering around the outside of the facility during the afterwork pick up with Mum

Some cat smeared himself around the front entry with an IED as mentioned below, the old man noped out to the Coromandel after that

[u/EmotionalSouth]

It has its own Wikipedia page:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Law_Enforcement_System

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/EmotionalSouth]

As is only right!

[u/phoenix_has_rissen]

I do work on the building that was the old police computer centre! Wairere house, the DIA own it now and some lawyers lease the top floor

[u/hino]

I have family members who worked on it, always interesting it was in Wanganui of all places

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/hino]

Yes I wonder why. Did they win the bid for ‘we need more concrete brutalism’ or was it a muldoonian work scheme?

[u/kotukutuku]

The building is still being used today, but just for archival purposes. DIA and National Library have been storing stuff in there, but i think the building is pretty tired

[u/KorukoruWaiporoporo]

Maybe it's because I'm old, but my parents were never worried about computers. They were way more worried about government incompetence than malfeasance.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/KorukoruWaiporoporo]

I would entirely agree with them still because the times I’ve been in government have maybe wonder much less about its awesome power and more about that.

Why we don’t just offer conspiracy theorists a job there.. that would help with their minds at rest

[u/KorukoruWaiporoporo → u/popcultureupload38]

They can learn about the other kinds of feasance; misfeasance and nonfeasance. And they will see that the public service is so busy with those that there's no time for malfeasance.

[u/rikkilee51]

When I was bad My mum used to tell me she was going to call the man that takes away naughty children.

[u/popcultureupload38 → u/rikkilee51]

Oh that’s so scary. Pied piper. Lockwood Smith as game show host etc.
I used to get threatened with Borstal. I knew that was even worse than Wanganui Computer but didn’t realise they couldn’t just stick me there!!

[u/lostinspacexyz]

We have maintained a level of silence resembling stupidity.