It’s always a question of priorities.
It’s sometimes a question of education and openess.

I really want to rant like a madman right now but I’ll just say this: bullshit.

Yeah, totally. It’s a bullshit answer. Academics merely need to be shown the possible value.

Either that or let them wither away as the next generation of blogging academics sweep them off. Because you know: they ARE coming.

If you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, get a new dog.

rhaaaaa! ;)

1)time

2)publish-perish (and blogs not fitting into that)

3)academia being hierarchical and blogs being level-ers

What are are the 4th and 5th ways of constructing this situation?

It’s the same thing as a wife and a husband fighting about whose turn it is to take out the garbage. They’re not fighting about that, but about something else which is more precarious. What are we actually fighting about? Sure, all of the social software / techno-utopians types would say that it’s the transformation of society and academia is one of the institutions protesting that change. But that’s too macro. I wonder if there’s something more specific that we could isolate? Something that makes blogs (in their current configuration) anathema to higher education?

Mike, I think you are correct to consider the personal, professional, and organizaional contexts of the faculty you talk to. You can’t ask or expect someone to ignore their reality just because you happen to be enthusiastic about weblogs, etc.

For example, there are probably a lot of things that others are passionate about, things that provide value to society, that each of us does not allocate any time to. As Karl said, it comes down to priorities.

There are a lot of academics and academic institutions who are working hard to make the fruits of academia open and free to all through the web (ex open access journals, dspace, opencourseware, etc). So I think there are a lot of academics who understand the value and potential of the web, and the benefit that openness can bring to society.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to figure out how blogs and wikis fit into all this!

I really enjoyed Seb’s comments. They make me think of fortune cookie tips about social software in academia ;)

One thing that I can’t shake is the fact that they are such a natural tool for academics. Academics are already in the business of creating and sharing information and knowledge.

We can carry this conversation on later. Thanks Ed, for commenting. I _am_ totally interested in to the academic POV in all this and (especially as a lowly undergrad far from the heart of the professional academic reality) will need help understanding their situation.

I spoke with my dad about the academic blog thing.. he’s an old school academic.

He said that “if I had a blog it would be so damn hard to find..I’d try to hide it as much as I could.”..and, “..not just any (insert dutch expletive) would be able to make a comment - you know, only those people who I think are on the same wavelength as me..” and finally, “I don’t understand this desire you and mike have to let everyone always know what is going on in your heads, I think it’s a privilege for someone to know my thoughts”

IMHO: and partly in response to my dad. My desire to write ideas in a public sphere is part of the post-modern condition. I think I was intellectually raised to think my idea is just another “already had” idea newly packaged according to my particular context. So the idea of sharing my ideas becomes less threatening.

A less psoitive intrepretation of the PM condition is this; as reality tv
demonstrates. No experience in life can pass unexplained or un-mediated. So blogs are a bit like that. I can’t dance if nobodies watching me.

Not neccesarily the same intellectual process as labouring in obscurity until you find something worth publishing.

It seems to me, that for some people the “site” of the information and the character of the audience is just as big a consideration as the opportunity for dialogue, so a blog is mor elike an uncomfortably public venue for an essentally private practise.

(big Mouth me)

On a slightly different but related note; I have taken quite a few forum style online classes over the last 2 years, and have done so because i enjoy the independence and the type of dialogue it created. When i suggested these classes (mostly in the poli sci department) to friends, they actually felt uncomfortable about displaying their knowledge (or potential misunderstanding) in front of 150 class mates (normal size for these classes) These people were not technophobes in any sense, but they were the type that did not like to raise their hand in class…i think blogging falls under the same idea… imho, the people who embrace it, are of a personality type, and it may have little to do with the technology or medium itself.

I dont see this as being a rejection of the technology or ignorance to its potential, rather about a personality type…. Some people talk alot, some people dont, i think this idea can carry over into digital space.

Sorry mike - just had to put my 2cents in =)

Also, its helpful that you’re suggesting another way of looking at it, as a question of personality type. However, it begs the question of what kind of “personality” does the academic system encourage and foster / construct?