Szukany blog nie istnieje.

I thought I’d darken an already dreary day writing about “nighthawking” by seeing what else my anonymous rodentine critic who calls himself “Buffet the Ham Pie Slayer” had written on his "Paul Barford response" blog now. Last time he was impudently posing questions about my apparel, sex life and aspirations apparently anticipating that I would answer. What next? I wondered.

Imagine my puzzlement when logging on to find a white screen appeared with „Nie znaleziono bloga” on it. It probably does not take much knowledge of Polish to work out is a negative, a verb (to find) and a noun which is the object of the verb. Can’t find the blog, eh? More interesting, his other pretentiously worded blog “The Mighty Buffet” (sic) also at the moment “cannot be found”.

So, has the metal detectorist tired of his silly game? Has he realized he’s not up to finding examples of the other eleven cut-and-paste categories of alleged falsehood in what I write about the dodgy dealings of the antiquities trade? Or has he realized that one way or another, the game would be up and his identity would be revealed and he’d actually be accountable for his vendetta of defamatory remarks?

Or has he at last realised (duh) that in attacking my blog for criticising what is bad in portable antiquities, he is aligning himself and to some extent fellow metal detectorists with the groups criticised in the blog, dodgy dealers, careless collectors, looters and all the rest? That his was the worst possible "response" a supposedly responsible hobby could muster against a blog pointing out the bits of the hobby that have gone so badly wrong.

Heritage "Crusade" needs detectorists' approval?

Buffy the anonymouse rodent fetishist really does not get it. In the blog which he and his guffawing low-brown sidekicks think is an adequate "response" to the issues which conservationists raise about the exploitation of the archaeological record merely as a mine for collectables he attempts to claim that raising these issues is damaging... well what? He reckons it is damaging the relationships with people who "care about history". He has even produced a picture worth more than a thousand of his words: "Barford[']s Heritage Crusade Needs YOU" proclaims somewhat effete cartoon mouse with teeth sprouting from his chin.

Well, actually it does not, I have no "crusade"(and if I did, it would certainly not recruit the likes of the readers of blogs like his anyway).

Instead I have my own views about artefact hunting and collecting. I think there are good reasons for saying that certain prevailing attitudes to them, especialy in the UK, are utterly mistaken. Consequently I make attempts to articulate why, to help me think them through. I do not need readers, I do not seek agreement, in fact I would welcome well-articulated confronting ideas with a firm basis in logic and fact against which to test and refine my own models.

Mr Buffy's puerile "responses" really do not fit the measure. It seems to me that in response to my explorations of some issues, he is the one embarked on a "crusade", or rather a vendetta against a single person.

The zero and the anonymous sniper

Buffy ('What, no Barford Blog?? ') cannot find this blog through the use of the link he himself gives on his "Barford-response" hate-blog. Maybe if he'd paid more attention in school, he'd know the difference between the numeral '0' and the letter 'o', and then he might get it poor chap. Certainly at the moment, this detectorist-ghetto blog is still up and running and reserved for answering the likes of him.

Buffy is trying (Its been a bad week for Barford) to throw a smoke screen over the Wikipedia page that suddenly appeared a few weeks ago. He pretends "It seems that someone hijacked Mr Barfords Wikipipedia (sic)entry and caused the now known to be "less than erudite" one to enter a state of apoplexy before he had to have his own entry removed from the worlds favourite dictionary. (sic) And I missed the whole damn thing. Bugger!". Hardly "highjacking" when a Steve Welton was the entire author of that attack page from beginning to end. A Steve Welton whose writing style shares clear parallels with the idiosyncracies of "Buffy's". Perhaps they are just soul-mates, or maybe there is more in that relationship....

Now Buffy claims "Not all is lost though as I am fortunate enough to have been forwarded a Cached copy of the entry along with the story of events as they unfolded", well, I "wonder" who sent him that, then?

Anyhow, Buffy says: "not only is it amusing, Mr Barfords Wikipedia entry does shed a whole load of new 'personal' light on Mr Barford and his whole 'raison d'etre'". The fact that it was a 'personal' attack presenting untrue information as encyclopaedeic "facts" was the reason why the Wikipedia editors deleted it. There was in fact no "personal" information there, the self-appointed author quite obviously knew nothing about the subject he was writing about beyond what they found in the Internet. By the way Buffy must have had a long "holiday", as Steve Welton began writing that page at the beginning of May and it was deleted in the middle of June.

So one of the things Buffy derives "from the cached Wikipedia page" is that "Barford has no qualifications" (What, no Qualifications?). Well, that's not surprising as that "encyclopedia entry" totally failed to discuss my university background and work, since the author knew nothing of it. Yet Buffy quotes from the Unidroit-L list an old post of mine, the implications which he chooses to ignore. Perhaps he thinks I am lying, but really I do not feel any compulsion to prove myself to a mere "metal detectorist" who canot even put his own true name under what he writes.

Buffy makes a mock confession of having laboured under a misconception about my academic titles [In the circumstances, I find the mocking of Catholics in that post offensive, but cultural sensitivity was never any UK "metal detectorist's" strength]. Nevertheless he'd be hard-put to demonstrate the truth of that with reference to the state of his blog on 7th July, where the only title he uses with reference to me in his blog is "Mr".

I've been deleted

The malicious page on Wikipedia purporting to be an encyclopedia article about me written by a metal detectorist has at last gone. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Steve_Welton
Who is Steve Welton and what have I ever done to him? Maybe he'd like to answer that on his equally obnoxious "barfordisation" blog, what is it he has got against me personally and why that he has decided to engage in this destructive vendetta against a single person he has never met, and - it turns out - knows next to nothing about? Why does he not "respond" to the points I make on my blog with something a little less puerile than personal attack?

Mr Welton has not been mentioned a single time on my "Portable Antiquities and Heritage Issues" blog, so the only thing Mr Welton can have against it is that it discusses portable antiquity and heritage issues - obviously he finds that fact uncomfortable. Seeing his inability to answer the points raised, I think we can easily understand why that might be.

Metal detectorist Wikiwonkydom

In general I am (unlike most of the academic world) a fan of Wikipedia, its a great idea, but obviously is prone to the whims of the Tom, Dick and Harriets that create it. Any text on Wikipedia related to "metal detecting" tends to be highly tendentious, as they are written by "metal detectorists". It's a waste of time trying to edit them to give a more balanced presentation (which in any case should be under the heading "portable antiquity collecting") and generally personally I have never never thought it worth the effort as they'd only change it back again.

Washington coin collector Peter Tompa found a Wikipedia page called Paul M. Barford and seems to believe that it is an accurate presentation. He is apparently not a very critical reader. Just as its author (one Steve Welton) is not a particularly fastidious author. He'll obviously write any old crap to try and discredit those he sees as his enemies. Personally I was not even aware until yesterday that there ever was a "Steve Welton" in the world. But I do now. He does not however restrict his attacks to me, he brings in another group of people concerned with the protection of the heritage, Heritage Action. I see that in the discussion page attached to the Wikipage concerned, its Chairman is objecting in no uncertain terms to the imposition. He writes:

In general terms, I know Paul Barford well, which the author doesn’t, and I confirm the article contains many distortions and lies which lead me to believe it is of malicious intent.
In specific terms I wish to cite the section titled “The Heritage Counter”. As Chairman of Heritage Action I should like to
point out 1.) that its title is not as suggested but is “The Heritage Action Artefact Erosion Counter” 2.) that it is not designed to highlight “various odd bits of metal unearthed by metal detectorists” but, in the words on our website “recordable artefacts” 3.) The quote from our website "The counter may or may not be a precise reflection" was cut short mid-sentence, deliberately to mislead in my view. It goes on “of the rate of depletion. The broad picture it paints, of millions of artefacts being progressively removed and society being deprived
of the associated knowledge of its past, is certainly accurate.” 4.) Paul Barford was NOT it’s creator – I was. It was my idea, my design, my accompanying text and Heritage Action’s algorithms. Paul was consulted, as were many others, and supports it, as do many others. In my view, since the true facts are freely available, the false facts were not mistaken but deliberate and intended
to both mislead regarding the nature of metal detecting and to blaggard one of it’s critics. As such, it should not be allowed to stand here. It reduces Wikipedia to a farce.
Should the author or any like-minded British metal detectorist wish to create a page about Heritage Action or me, Nigel Swift, they are free to do so. However, it would seem to me that in view of the global reach of Wikipedia its effect will not be as they anticipated. In the rest of the world people who are in favour of archaeological conservation are well thought of whereas metal detectorists, who help themselves, are despised. The prospect of the latter attempting to discredit the former will be seen for precisely what it is.
Heritage Action (talk)
11:36, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Mr Welton may think that by launching this ill-researched, ill conceived and thoroughly objectionable personal attack, he is strengthening the position of metal detecting in the United Kingdom. Instead he is simply compromising it, showing the milieu for what it is. If Mr Welton or Mr Buffy wish to "respond" to the issues raised by those who suggest we need to take a closer look at the long term archaeological effects of artefact hunting and collecting on the archaological resource, then I suggest that if they do not want to get laughed right out of court for their ridiculous aggressive posing and strutting, then they should responsd with proper responses, not attacks. the same goes for Mr Tompa and his coin collecting mates over the other side of the sea.

The Pitfalls of writing an Encyclopedia Article if you are an Ignorant Malicious Intellectual Gnome

Somebody calling themselves Steve Welton has written a wikipedia article about "Paul M. Barford". A sample:

Paul M Barford is a British born former archaeologist (*Polish- Archaeolog) who in 1986 moved to Poland and is currently living in central Warsaw. Formerly an assistant lecturer at the Institute of Archaeology, *University of Warsaw (*Polish - Uniwersytet Warszawski) and an Inspector of Ancient Monuments in the *Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland (*Polish- Ministerstwo Kultury i Dziedzictwa Narodowego). During his time as inspector Barford, it is believed that Paul Barford personaly inspected many of Polands Ancient Monuments.Paul Barford also wrote articles on conservation during his time inspecting *[1] Paul Barford is the author of various books, articles, Blogs,Internet forum threads and several reports on excavations in England and Poland. Paul Barford now works as a translator. Paul M Barford is interested in *Slavic Peoples ,in particular *Early Slavs and the development of Slavic tribes as they spread across central Europe and has since written a book on the subject. Education & Qualifications Currently unknown.

Good grief. As many as eight factual mistakes and three spelling mistakes in one paragraph. What kind of an "encyclopedia" is that? So if the author actually currently does not know anything about the subject's educational background, why did he put pen to paper before finishing his research? What "qualifications" does the author of the article have for writing on this subject, it is not his knowledge of Polish or what the subject has done for a start. In fact where are the date of birth and death of the subject? What was the subject doing between 1974 and 1986? Was the subject always engaged in research into the early Slavs since 1986, or was there some other field of research involved? Where's the sex scandal?

It is clear from the topics which the writer "selects" for discussion, that he is a "metal detectorist".

This in Wikipedia terminology is an "attack page" and for this reason, I doubt it will be up for long. The author seems not to take into account that not everybody reading an encyclopedia thinks that metal detecting is acceptable. His writing lacks focus.
Besides which he is deliberately and slyly misleading.

"Current interests/ Since the early 1990s Paul M Barfords main interests have been searching eBay and also artefact hunting and collecting and the market in portable antiquities and coins. Paul Barford is also an avid blogger and internet forum user."

and

Coin Collecting/ Paul Barford has a particular interest in coin collecting & *Numismatics and is a regular contributor to internet discussions regarding coins and coin collecting, especially coins offered for sale, where his insight and knowledge has proved invaluable in proving the sometimes disputed *provenance of rare coins.

This no doubt is slanderous in the circumstances, besides which the author displays ignorance, there was no eBay in "the early 1990s".

Interestingly, I found an eBay seller called "Swelton" - and there is no trace of a metal detectorist Steve Welton on the PAS database. I doubt it is his real name. Like the sly individuals who wrote to the Times falsely using my name...

It is obvious that metal detectorists are worried about some of the arguments that are being raised against the glib justifications that are offered in favour of the hobby of the expoloitation of archaeological sites merely as a source of collectables. Instead however of addressing these arguments, a whole bunch of them is merly engaged in diversive tactics of deception like this "black propaganda".

Buffy declies to play the "issues" game: he has another one of his own

"Just seeing when you visited. posted by BUFFET, The Ham Pie Slayer at 13:21 on 30-Dec-2008". I replied:

I am just checking to see if you are going to post anything of substance, as you promised. To see if you are going to attack the knotty issues rather than continually anonymously snipe at the personal traits of those (or just ONE of those) that raise them. There's ten thousand guffawing tekkie mates out there waiting for the next little mousy taunt. Not to mention Dave Connolly.
Paul Barford

The Buffetisation of Debate on Conservation

It seems to me that "Buffy" the self-styled “middle-class detectorist” who apparently imagines he is the conservation lobby’s intellectual nemesis has lost sight of his own arguments. The sole basis of his blog consists of a series of taunting accusations that in writing of the erosion of the archaeological record by artefact hunting and collecting I am engaging in something he calls “Barfordisation” of the hobby. In reply to his comments, let us simply observe that (what seems more justifiable to label) “Buffetisation”:

- puts the presenter of the argument above the substance of the argument,

- uses inverted snobbery to gain the moral high ground,

- utilises negative social stereotyping to maintain that high ground.

Maybe person-calling-himself-Buffet could look in his own "mirror" . At least I write under my own name so it is clear who is saying what.

Buffy promises his readers "later on we will further examine ‘Barfordisation’ within the context of the much maligned and vilified activity of metal detecting". Hmm. if past performance is anything to judge by, somehow I do not think this is really going to be worth waiting for. Probably a lot of glib platitudes, puerile personal sniping interspersed with things he's found on the internet that some famous bloke has said and pictures of assorted rodents. Still I am sure it'll keep his tekkie M8s amused.

Buffy the Pie Gobbler Blogs and Gobs

Buffy the Ham Pie Slayer strikes again. He says: "I notice that this Blog has reached across the water to the depths of Poland and Warsaw in particular". Hardly surprising as its author or one of his mates sent me a message inviting me to look at his handiwork. Needless to say, hiding behind his pseudonym, does not advance any argument about the erosion of the archaeological record or the Valetta Convention or any meritorial matters I have raised about portable antiquity collecting, but focusses largely on my mistyping, and quite unneccessarily lectures me on the use of the word "perjury", (I had earlier expressed surprise that a person claiming to be "working in law" would misuse it in the way the author of the new blog did).

Never mind, the guy clearly has nothing to say about what I have posted on my other blog about the ethics and archaeological implications of collecting or any of the wider issues, so intends merely to continue (as do most artefact collectors it seems) a series of personal attacks. It seems that, despite being so concerned in the earlier posts on his blog to point out how unlike the rest of the metal detectorists in the UK he is, he intends to behave in this respect in no way differently from any of the rest.