To blog or not to blog (pre-tenure), that is the question a lot of young professors ask themselves, wondering whether their adventures in HTML will come back to haunt them as much as that pesky ghost bothered Hamlet.

Janet Stemwedel will soon be able to provide an answer. The assistant professor of philosophy at San Jose State University blogged on Adventures in Ethics and Science about finishing her tenure dossier, in which she’s included a section on academic blogging. For proof, check out this photo. Ms. Stemwedel didn’t take the risk without some encouragement. My department has been quite insistent that the blogging I do here does constitute a kind of scholarly activity that ought to be recognized. They think that communicating philosophy to a wider audience is A Good Thing. So she had a colleague evaluate some of her posts and included them in the packet.

Some other bloggers aren’t so confident that their digital activities will earn the respect of older colleagues who sit in judgment. Chris Rowan, a postdoc in geology at the University of Johannesburg, said on Highly Allochthonous that some department members have reacted with “vague bemusement” to his blogging. Another blogger, commenting on Mr. Rowan’s post, said, “Most professors and staff that I’ve tried to explain it to have given me the impression they consider it a waste of time.”

Nobody in the court really understood Hamlet, either.