![\"i-54cced2edcf95f4db81bcbfc1c403d92-dice.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/principles\/wp-content\/blogs.dir\/467\/files\/2012\/04\/i-54cced2edcf95f4db81bcbfc1c403d92-dice.jpg\")
The Corporate Masters have posted a new Ask a ScienceBlogger question:<\/p>\nThe Corporate Masters have posted a new Ask a ScienceBlogger question:<\/p>\n
\nThe question (submitted by a reader) is this: There are many, many academic bloggers out there feverishly blogging about their areas of interest. Still, there are many, many more academics who don’t. So, why do you blog and how does blogging help with your research?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Taking these in the opposite order, how does blogging help with my research? The answer is simple: it doesn’t. Not one bit.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I am an experimental physicist, so my research is done in the lab, not
\nin my office (well, data analysis, when I have data to analyze, is
\ndone in my office, but that’s a small fraction of my research time).
\nTalking to other people via the Internet doesn’t really do any good,
\nunless it’s in order to get the answers to narrow technical questions,
\nand that’s not scintillating blog fodder. To put it bluntly, if I
\nspent the time I spend blogging working in the lab, I’d get more done
\nthan I do.<\/p>\nSo, why do I blog? If blogging doesn’t help my research, why do I do it?<\/p>\n
I blog because it amuses me to do so. It’s a hobby, not a part of my
\njob. Believe it or not– and contrary to a lot of the advice new
\nfaculty receive– being an academic is not and should not be an
\nall-consuming avocation. We are allowed to have lives outside the
\nclassroom and research lab, though deans and department chairs try to
\ndownplay that fact.<\/p>\nNot every thing in an academic’s life has to be part of their research
\nprogram. The idea that there’s something wrong with people who have
\noutside interests is one of the most toxic ideas in all of academia,
\nand probably plays a role in driving some good people out of science.<\/p>\nThe time that I spend blogging is not time that would be spent on
\nresearch if I didn’t have the blog. It’s time taken away from other
\noutside interests– reading fiction, watching tv, various domestic
\nchores. The blog doesn’t help my research, but it doesn’t hurt,
\neither.<\/p>\nNow, it’s not true that the blog doesn’t do anything to help me in my
\njob– it’s actually been fairly helpful in my teaching, by allowing me
\nto test-drive some explanations, and pick up suggestions from readers.
\nAnd I’ve made a few tentative efforts to use it the platform provided
\nby blogging to do some good for the profession and science in general,
\nwhich I may expand in the future. The money doesn’t hurt, either.<\/p>\nBut at bottom, I maintain this blog because it amuses me to do so. And
\nthe minute it starts to be more annoying than amusing, I’ll stop.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Corporate Masters have posted a new Ask a ScienceBlogger question: The question (submitted by a reader) is this: There are many, many academic bloggers out there feverishly blogging about their areas of interest. Still, there are many, many more academics who don’t. So, why do you blog and how does blogging help with your… Continue reading Ask a ScienceBlogger: Why Do Academics Blog?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,41,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-academia","category-ask_a_scienceblogger","category-blogs","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2690\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}