Scott McLemee,"A Dogged Pursuit," Inside Higher Ed, 29 September, notes that publishers have begun to use blogs as a means of getting the word out about their books, but the quick summary does no justice to Scott's column. At University Diaries, Margaret Soltan likes this passage:

The rather hysterical tone prevailing in some quarters calls to mind what sociologists call"moral panic." But the iron cage of bureaucracy is, after all, a strange thing: Today, there are timid souls who worry that a prospective colleague's blog might be a record of torrid threesomes indulged while plotting to assassinate the dean. Tomorrow they will be retired, or laughed off campus — whereupon blogging might well become mandatory, rather than forbidden.

There's a substantiating bit of evidence in the fact that the Law School faculty at the University of Chicago now has its own The Faculty Blog.

Jonathan Dresner - 9/30/2005

I think it more likely that it would be a way of checking off competency (technical, writing) and service (public, field) boxes on the contractual checklist; you could always prove yourself other ways, but blogging would be the assumed method.

Of course, if academia ever takes blogging seriously as scholarly writing, teaching or other core competency, then evaluation is going to be a real kick: number of comments? Links (weighted by TTLB score?) or awards? Number of hits, or citation by high quality academic bloggers (CT and Cliopatria could become considerably more powerful)?

Sharon Howard - 9/29/2005

I bloody hope not. What would be the point if it weren't done from choice and for pleasure? Horrible thought.