Blogging professors

When I first started blogging in 2004, I thought it would be only a matter of a few years before a significant fraction -- say 10-30% -- of all professors would have their own blogs. Surely, I thought, many brilliant professors would have no shortage of (and no shortage of interest in expressing) fabulous ideas and opinions worthy of wider attention and discussion.

But I was wrong. My rough estimate is that, currently, typical research universities (with, say, 1000 or so professors!) have no more than a handful of active faculty bloggers (for some reasonable definition of active, which might include a minimum traffic or readership level).

However, it's not too late. With the continuing collapse of the economic model for traditional journalism, there is significant demand for expert opinion and new ideas. How should a university encourage faculty blogging?

Set up branded group blogs for faculty, using a common template, perhaps organized by themes: health science, engineering and technology, basic science, politics and economics, psychology and cognition, etc. These don't even need to be hosted by the university -- they could be on Wordpress or Blogger.

Group blogs can regularly produce fresh content, even if each contributor posts infrequently.

Hire a grad student to do some light editing, manage comments, and occasionally stimulate the faculty if the rate of posting falls off. Make posting really easy for the professors -- allow them just to shoot off an email with the post content, and have the student clean it up and upload it to the site.

Advertise the blogs in alumni communications, campus news, and other university publications.

Will it work? Ultimately it depends on the faculty...