The second good reason is that writing is thinking. A lot of the time we don’t really know what we think about an idea until we write it out. Blogging is a great way to do this. Lilia Efimova has just finished a PhD looking at this, and her conclusion is that blogs are useful as ‘personal thinking space’. In my personal experience, this is very true, and another good reason to write more consistently, for either a general audience or for your peers. I’ve tried out a lot of ideas here first that I’ve ended up using as examples in lectures, and also a couple that will end up in papers at some point.

The last good reason to write all the time (and accessably) is that it helps avoid the syndrome where academics show ‘a fondness for collecting a salary and getting away with as little intellectual intercourse as possible‘. It’s a great way to engage, and I think we should all be looking for more of these.

So what are you waiting for? Start a blog now!