Blogging in academia

Here's an interesting bit from a woman who suggests weblogs have a valid place in academic writing and research, and feels that her weblog should be considered in her application for tenure. What I find strikes a chord with me is her wondering where her semi-personal weblog fits in; it's not traditional academic writing, nor is it purely personal, but she knows it has a place somewhere. Seems awfully close to how I feel about this blog - I'm not quite sure why it's here, but I enjoy it, and I think it'll become clearer to me as time goes on.

Perhaps blogging just is what it is - a new form that we haven't quite come to terms with, that hopefully remains more or less stable after the hype dies down. I'm curious to see what happens to blogging once everybody stops gushing about it. Will it suddenly become a faux pas to give out your URL? Will people roll their eyes and snicker when you say you maintain a blog? Will our comments become a wasteland of spam? I've never been particularily good at predicting trends (I remember the first time I saw Mosaic - I thought "um, the Web is just like Gopher but with pictures"). All I can say for sure is things change.