Daniel Lemire's blog

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Blogging is networking

Two years ago, I asked whether academic blogging was still relevant. At the time, two famous bloggers had stopped (Sébastien Paquet and Stephen Downes). Evidently, I kept on blogging. I even took up microblogging.

Let me revisit some of the benefits.

  • Bloggers are more visible. This blog has over 900 readers. Some are students, others are engineers, teachers, entrepreneurs, researchers or professors.
  • Blogging is good for knowledge management: leaving a trace of your thoughts is always a good idea. You are also forced to flush out your ideas and you get immediate feedback.

However, reading Daniel Tunkelang today, I realized that the most important benefit is the networking effect. A blog without a social network is nothing. Nobody wants to read a list of random thoughts. What makes blogging rewarding for me are the comments and the link I receive. But I enjoy even more reading others and commenting elsewhere.

In effect, good blogging makes you part of a rich and open community. That is very valuable.