User talk:NickW

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You have new messages (last change).

Please note that my talk page is for constructive discussion - not for personal attacks, insulting comments, or fantasy. I'm not interested so keep it to yourself.

I'll reply to all talk on this page unless you specify otherwise. NickW 12:10, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Welcome

Well, no one seems to have greeted you - so Hello. Charles Matthews 11:32, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for the welcome Charles! NickW 08:26, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

[edit] London Action Resource Centre

I can understand why you want to hide the fact that the LARC is hierarchicly run, but why do you want to edit the Antisystemic Library out of this page? Paki.tv 17:59, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] London Wikimeet Dec 3

I'm just making aware of this. Hope you can make it. Wikipedia:Meetup/London Theresa Knott (Tart, knees hot) 09:56, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know Theresa - been a bit busy - hopefully I'll make the next one! NickW 23:01, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Culture Shock (band)

Thanks for getting this article started. It looks good.TimMony 20:30, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

No worries Tim - I'll see if I can dig some more info. out. NickW 12:37, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Dreadlocks and cultural appropriation

Hey. :) I remember our earlier exchange in Talk:Dreadlocks and thought I'd refer you to the new article on cultural appropriation. You didn't seem to pick up on my analogy between Germans and yarmulkas, so I thought you might find this article useful. I didn't author the original version, but did a rather extensive rewrite. Perhaps it will further explain the reactions you get from some black folks regarding your hair. Peace 2 u. deeceevoice 08:05, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the link. It's understandable that some peeps think all white dreads are necessarily appropriated, and some of course will be... For me however my dreads are 100% natural and have never seen a hairdresser (or any kind of intervention except the odd 'ripping' apart). My 'inspiration' comes from my own (white) culture and heritage and the nature of my hair (interestingly not very curly at all). Maybe convergent evolution works as an analogy for what I'm saying... NickW 12:42, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Maori (New Zealand) dreads

Do you have some informations about the Maori (New Zealand) dreads you could include into the dreadlocks article? And a picture maybe? I was searching for one but couldn't find one without copyright. CoYep 22:02, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

I've asked around and discovered that Maori dreads probably aren't indigenous, and instead reflect a fashion for hip-hop. Not sure how accurate any of this is though!NickW 10:35, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Varve

I apologise for talking too loosely when I said the phrase calendar band of orbitally forced cyclicity was nonsense. What I in fact meant was that it was incomprehensible to the reader who is not already versed in Stratigraphy (in which case they probably would not be reading the article). The sentence just needs rephrasing in nontechnical language because I have absolutely no idea what it means An encyclopedia exists to inform not baffle! Sorry again - Adrian Pingstone 11:22, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Fair enough! Getting the balance between informing and baffling can be tricky - and it is easy to forget when you're well-versed in a subject and its jargon yourself (and probably too precious about your own contributions!). Thanks for your reality-check. The phrase in plain English can be interpreted thus; many geological sequences display cyclicity, cyclicity can be created by periodic forces, one of these forces is the Earth's orbit (and variations of), these forces can influence sedimentary processes over a range of frequencies / cycles, including those in the calendar band (i.e. seasonal changes within the space of the year), varves form because of seasonal changes, hence they fall within the 'calendar band of orbitally forced cyclicity' (as opposed to numerous other frequencies and forcings)... Phew! See what you mean - on reflection it's better left out! NickW 11:49, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Nick, thank you for your very understanding reply. I no longer have a problem with that word teleconnection because I see you have changed the sentence to explain what it means. Best Wishes - Adrian Pingstone 12:43, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Stone circle merge

In the past User:Wiglaf argued against it, arguing "this ([[Stone circle (Iron Age) ]]) is a specific burial custom that should not be confused with circles like stone henge". Pavel Vozenilek 23:46, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Hi Pavel - thanks for the above. To an extent this is fair enough - but at the moment there is one general article on stone circles and one very specific. We should decide whether to go for an overarching article or several specific articles. I think we could do either, but consistency would be nice. At the moment the arrangement seems a bit odd. There's also no reason why the Iron Age article wouldn't fit into the general article - precisely because the general article is general! I think the 'Iron Age' tag could also be confusing. Surely 'burial' or perhaps a geographic notation would be more appropriate - unless of course we categorise or label stone circle articles by 'Age'. NickW 09:20, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Wushu

thankyou for your concern, however my contribution is NOT vandalism. Find me a quote from wikipedia's policies that accurately reinforces your actions or you will be reported to the admin area for abusing the edit function.

[edit] Synthetic Dreadlocks

Im just wondering why the Dreadlock article keeps being reverted and the link to the Synthetic Dreadlocks page is removed?

Not sure how you can contact me back, so heres an email address you can reply to matthimself@btinternet.com

Hi - I've been doing this because so far there's been consensus on this article to remove external links that advertise commercial products. Have a look at the discussion page for the article and you'll see what I mean. The discussion page is a good place to make your case for keeping the link... NickW 17:23, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Carnival against Capitalism

I would contend that a 'peaceful march becomes a riot' is a pretty good description of what happened at J18, but hey, the reason that i'm calling is that i made a Carnival against Capitalism page and thought you might have some input for it ... cheers Mujinga 22:25, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Hi Mujinga - it was 'march' I was really objecting to! RTS never organised marches! Like the new article - I'll be sure to help out on it. NickW 08:33, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Cool! Mujinga 20:59, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] PGA and Invisible Dictatorship

Please see Invisible Empire and leaderless resistance - these debates are neither new nor centred on the PGA - and include the POV of those whose experience of 'leaderless' 'non-organisations' and 'tyranny' is a bit more extensive you possible imagine ... or possibly are capable of imagining! 62.25.106.209 14:45, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Thankyou 62.25.106.209. However, my imagination is quite capable of not only understanding the concepts you mention but also of understanding the motivations of those involved attempting to discredit the PGA and LARC through mis-use of Wikipedia. By the way Some people find IP addresses somewhat invisible - maybe you should get a named user account to demonstrate your presumable dedication to openess and transparency. NickW 19:18, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Don't mention it - unfortunately you prove the point - your paranoia reveals your limited imagination - unless of course you were to employ the paranoic-critical method - but then you'd have to stop relying on presumptions and feeble illusions. Maybe you should stop abusing your self so much - masturbate a bit less and think a bit more... 195.92.40.49 09:46, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Only trying to be helpful! 195.92.40.49 10:13, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Paranoia? You mean first hand experience and direct observation. Anyway - ta' for the insults - I'd appreciate it if you could leave my talk page for more constructive use. NickW 10:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
No, I mean lying - to yourself and others around you. 195.92.40.49 10:17, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] London Action Resource Centre

Hi NickW, You seem to be locked into some kind of dispute with Harrypotter and Paki.tv on the LARC page. I wonder if i can help resolve it? The page certainly needs improvement! As someone who was involved with the start of the centre, can you tell me a bit more about this controversy over how the place is run? And perhaps we can have a discussion on the talk page about how to progress further with this page. Cheers Mujinga 11:58, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the offer Mujinga - your help resolving the dispute over the LARC article would be welcome. My perspective over the controversy on LARC's organisation is simple - but first I'll outline my own involvement.
I was one of the original group - of mostly ex-London RTS - who started the LARC project in 1999. Our idea was to find a permanent space which could be used to catalyse and sustain direct action following J18. We found a small building in Whitechapel and spent quite a few years on practical stuff - knocking down walls, putting in floorboards etc.. Even while LARC was still a building site we were using it e.g. for the RTS Guerilla Gardening action in 2000.
While we were doing all this we were also trying to come up with a way of running the space in accordance with our principles and visions - and in a way that would keep the place secure and sustainable. So for example - we believe in freedom but also believe that allowing drugs to be sold in the building was counter-productive - it would give the state an easy way of closing us down. We had to find a balance between our ideals and the necessary pragmatism to keep LARC from being closed down.
Initially we explored the idea of creating something similar to a housing co-op but eventually decided upon creating a company - it was the only solution we found to ensuring the 'legality' of the space. Most of the original group then became directors in this company. At no point has there ever been a notion that the directors 'own' LARC and could utilise it for profit. In fact, many people felt that by becoming a director was to put yourself at personal risk - i.e. to be associated by name with any activity at LARC. Certainly, to anyone who has ever particpated in direct action and had the cops 'knock' on your door, this decision would appear unattractive.
The details and day-to-day guidelines for LARC have always been established by the users - including many of the original group - who all meet every month.
Over the years numerous direct action groups, and individuals have used LARC for the purpose with which it was created, and within the guidelines created collectively by the users of the space. I haven't been involved actively since 2002 - and in fact, only visit the place a couple of times each year at most - but I still support LARC and recognise that it is still functioning as intended.
Re: the dispute. As often happens with any space (protest camp, squat etc..) people get attracted who have an agenda very different from the agenda that created and sustains the space. This happened with LARC. Two people turned up and got involved - but did so in a way that was contrary to LARCs whole purpose. The two people in question were Harrypotter and Paki.tv - who were also the West Essex Zapatista group (so far as I know from their comments - while they seem keen to name people like myself and Mark Brown they are less forthcoming with their own names!). I had little to do with either of them - mainly because I had pretty much left LARC by then. However, their activities were so destructive that I heard about what they had been doing, and I returned to the AGM in 2004 to help deal with the situation. The AGM discussed their activities - they were both there to comment - and took a vote. We normally work by consensus - but that was impossible given the situation.
It ended up with Harrypotter and Paki.tv being expelled from LARC. This is something no-one likes doing but at times it's the only solution. Anyone who can't understand this has probably never been involved with direct action - and certainly not with direct action based around a space.
Following their expulsion, Harrypotter and Paki.tv started what is essentially a campaign against LARC and anyone they identify with it. The PGA issue is somewhat seperate - although from what I can see they apply the same perspective (LARC had functioned as an infopoint for PGA so there is some overlap). From what I can figure out, neither of them have ever taken any meaningful direct-action, and instead concentrate their efforts at misrepresentation and general obscuration. They seem intent on discovering conspiracies and dubious motives. I think a lot of their behaviour on Wikipedia illustrates this. While they create a lot of noise most of the support for their views comes from material they create themselves - hence the problems they have in providing valid sources for their statements.
As for LARC - as you can see from the LARC webpage - numerous groups have used and still used LARC as a base and place to meet.
Here's the email that went out following the 2004 AGM explaining what happened:

Statement following LARC Annual General Meeting, 2.12.04

At this year's London Action Resource Centre (LARC) Annual General Meeting, a decision was made (by majority vote) to exclude two individuals who had been behaving disruptively and often abusively for some time. They are now not welcome within the building. Their names are Fabian and Asim, part of a group called West Essex Zapatista.

We aren\'t happy to have had to resort to such an emergency measure, but felt that the long-term of survival of LARC was under threat, since people from most of the groups currently using and maintaining the building have become so distressed by the situation that they will stay involved only if these individuals are no longer using it. (These groups include Queeruption, London Indymedia, London Rising Tide, Wombles & Rhythms of Resistance.)

Both these individuals have contributed a lot of their time and energy to LARC since they became involved but much of their political activity has consisted of parasitical 'involvement' in other groups, creating divisions and an atmosphere of mistrust both in the building and on a much wider scale. A situation has been reached where they are no longer trusted by the majority of regular users of the building. There seems to be a pattern of destructive, duplicitous behaviour going back many, many years in the case of Fabian, but we have decided to list examples from the last year or so, when they both became involved with LARC:

1.) The 'Our Mayday' website, set up in part by Fabian and Asim, has published statements and leaflets put out by the Wombles, but with several alterations so as to libel the Wombles. Maybe the strongest example was the posting up on Our Mayday of the Beyond ESF call to take part in an action to highlight Ken Livingstone\'s involvement with the ESF and to disrupt his speech to it. Added to this text was a further text - not written by the Wombles - which called for Livingstone to be violently attacked, and for a fatwa to be issued from LARC. When there was a backlash against the disruption of the ESF meeting in protest at Livingstone, a letter of condemnation signed by several trade union and NGO 'leaders' cited this incitement as a sign of Beyond ESF and the Wombles\' bad behaviour, and as such diminished support for the action.

Further to that, it was reported that the incitatory text had been sent from a LARC computer (thus defaming LARC), and that the individual who had registered the computer was the same as the one arrested at the ESF rally on the Sunday. So he was forced to circulate a statement disassociating himself from the actions of this small group of people using LARC as their base.

2.) He and other individuals involved with LARC have experienced seeing their statements, emails etc. altered in order to misrepresent their positions and expose them to ridicule and unfounded criticisms. The use of Wiki technology seems to have made this sort of falsification easier to carry out.

3.) The Wombles have been subjected to a campaign of false accusation which has damaged their ability to outreach and work with others. False emails purporting to be from the Wombles were sent out from wombles@cyber-rights.net.

4.) Peoples\' Global Action (PGA): We are aware that networks like PGA are far from perfect and can reflect many of the problems of the misuse of power that we seek to confront and transcend in the wider world. But nothing will improve in an atmosphere where people become afraid to speak or act for fear of being hyper-critiqued, distorted or even subjected to character assassination.

Several ongoing processes within PGA, for example in Asia and on gender, have been disrupted, undermined and manipulated in various ways by these two individuals, who actively look for (potential) problems or conflicts, in order to exaggerate them and/or undermine other individuals involved. It may not be worth going too deeply into the motivations for this sort of activity, but becoming the centre of attention and occupying the moral high ground seem to be a part of it.

There were problems at this year\'s PGA conference in Belgrade, the most high-profile of which was when one of these individuals entered a daily meeting discussing day-to-day logistical issues concerning the conference, pulled down his trousers and pants and wiped his arse on the document that he considered to be problematic. Several people at this meeting, particularly those not familiar with his concerns, were disturbed by this action.

On returning from Belgrade, controversy was whipped up over what was presented as being an invitation extended at the conference for fascists to attend future PGA events. On further examination of the minutes in question, it became clear that nothing of the sort had been said, let alone agreed on as a proposal. It was agreed, however, at the most recent PGA London meeting that the wording was open to misinterpretation, and a suggested clarification of those minutes is currently being circulated in London before being sent to the PGA Europe process email list. One of these individuals was excluded from a meeting held at LARC to discuss the possibility of a \'Climate Caravan\' to the global PGA conference in Nepal in 2005, and attended by people from the UK and continental Europe. He has claimed that this was done because he is Asian and because he regards PGA to be institutionally racist. In fact, he was excluded because he sees PGA as \'bankrupt\', and because he is not trusted.

Some people involved with LARC and PGA, reacting to the suggestion of the individuals in question that we should review PGA\'s position as a \'PGA Infopoint\', suggested a facilitated meeting to discuss these and other concerns. This meeting was postponed due to lack of outside facilitation. It also never gained the support of the larger number of people working on the PGA process in London, for whom the breakdown of trust was so final that any attempt to patch up differences and move on - normally the best way of resolving strong differences - was thought to be pointless.

Many of these issues did come up at the PGA London meeting at LARC on 26.11.04, but while it agreed to send out the Belgrade clarification, it exacerbated tensions when Fabian cast unsubstantiated fascistic aspersions about someone who happened, fortunately, to be in the meeting and who was able to refute them utterly. (The minutes of this meeting are available for those who request them.)

We are under no illusions that LARC, while being an amazing potential and actual resource for our movements, needs more support if it is to really thrive.

The good news is that, as well as the groups currently using the space, there\'s a lot more positive stuff waiting to happen, like groups queuing up to use the office space, a rebirth of monthly film nights, the installation of heating and a chance to install a printing press in the basement, to name four examples.

We hope that tonight\'s meeting has gone a long way towards restoring an atmosphere of trust and mutual aid within LARC.

Thanks for reading,

The LARC Collective.

thanks for taking the time to fill me in. harrypotter says here that he is not happy with me arbitrating this dispute. im investigating just how to take this further, becuase its quite a bizarre case. but it seems to me Paki.tv and harrypotter are pursuing a vendetta against the LARC through wikipedia (as well as other channels perhaps) and this runs contrary to wikipedia principles. Mujinga 02:29, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks Mujinga - I'm pleased a third party has taken the time and effort to investigate this at last! NickW 10:30, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
There is no question of any Vendetta, unless it is being done by NickW who seeks to prevent any balanced view of what is going on at LARC. e.g.: From what I can figure out, neither of them have ever taken any meaningful direct-action, and instead concentrate their efforts at misrepresentation and general obscuration. Having been involved in direct action since the late sixties, and in particular having to deal with direct racist and fascist attacks you can understand I find this sort of comment particularly distatsteful. Sources have been cited as regards Fascist infiltration of the PGA. A position of no Platform for fascists is not that of a vendetta. Harrypotter 19:05, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Once again the LARC article and my position on it is being subjected to doublespeak and nonsense. My comments on your behaviour are in response to your repeated vandalism and requests for more info. on the dispute from a third party. You're coming pretty close to calling me fascist in the above - and that I won't tolerate - as per my comment at the top of this talk page. Please save your conspiracy fantasy for elsewhere. NickW 20:24, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, it is very clear that I am not calling you a fascist - and I would of course say that if I thought that was the case. What is clear is that the PGA stated in their minutes that they were opening their doors to fascists - and indeed Leonid Savin a member of Alexander Dugin's Eurasia Party did take a promnent position running the PGA info point in Ukraine. It is also clear that when the issue of fascist infiltration of the PGA was raised, including in the context of the October 2004 disruption of the ESF meeting, the LARC responses was to expel those who rased these concerns. As you played a key role in that process, doesn't this make you a fascist collaborator? Obviously a fascist collaborator is quite different to a fascist. Of course you could always put a stop to this collaboration . . . (check Duginist website for a picture of Mr Savin at the fascist boot camp.Harrypotter 13:32, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Request for Comment: London Action Resource Centre

hello, i have set up an rfc here to see if we can resolve this dispute. As one of the persons involved in the dispute, i would like to ask you to make a comment in the section entitled "Statements by editors previously involved in dispute". Cheers! Mujinga 03:22, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I've just posted a short statement summarising my view of what's been happening. NickW 10:30, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Offline

I'm offline for a week or so - so will not be around to participate further in the LARC article and attempts at resolving the current dispute. NickW 20:02, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Peel artists category for deletion

Hi - it is currently likely the category for artists who recorded Peel Sessions may be deleted. I think you contributed or supported it at one time. If you support keeping it please contribute here[1] Thanks Tony Corsini 01:44, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

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