The Ugly in Blogging, According to Professor Gill

David Gill offers some reflections on the "Good, Bad and Ugly" of archaeoblogging (Looting Matters, Wednesday, January 1, 2014).

Blogging about the antiquities market raises certain uncomfortable questions. A paid Washington lobbyist enjoys making dismissive comments about 'archaeo-bloggers' (even when the archaeologists making the comments can be in tenured university posts). Sensitivities over topics such as Heritage Crime in the UK and the silence from some who record the portable finds shows that blogging can create tensions. I was disappointed to note at a recent conference in UCL that those raising genuine concerns on blogs were being dismissed as 'trolls' (an abuse of the term?).

Obviously even some of the universities in Britain cannot tolerate questioning of current policies on the collecting of and commerce in archaeological artefacts (even more disappointing in that I am a graduate of UCL, which was a different place in those days).