[Air-l] Reactions to PhD blogs at conference

[Mary-Helen Ward]

Hi all

I was in the session at the conference on Friday when Mel Gregg  
showed some screen shots of blogs that are kept by academics and by  
PhD candidates. I was quite surprised at the reactions in the room -  
a lot of people laughed at the things that were blogged by the PhD  
students, and even when someone sitting near the front called out  
"It's not funny!" the laughter continued. I also thought that I  
discerned some anger  - or some other strong emotion - around me  
(near the back).

I'm doing a PhD on the process of doing a PhD, with a group of  
blogging candidates (myself included), so I was very interested in  
these reactions. Unfortunately I had to leave to catch a flight  
before that group of papers had finished so I couldn't ask any of the  
people in the room why they had reacted that way to the screenshots.  
I'd be really interested if anyone who was there could reflect on  
those reactions - either here on the list or privately if you think  
that might be more appropriate.

Thanks in advance

M-H