THE DEATH OF LAW-STUDENT WEBLOGS? Orin Kerr poses a question about law-student weblogs at The Volokh Conspiracy. Interesting comments, too.
My impression? This commenter might be on to something--
And this one too--
On the other hand, both comments are overstated. As another commenter points out, sometimes weblogs aren't a liability: "Will Baude was blogging at Crescat even before YLS. He's now clerking for [Chief Justice Roberts]." And though there are plenty of other web-based platforms like Facebook, many law students are still blogging.
Orin Kerr suggests that as compared to 2002-2004, law-student weblogs may no longer be "an important part of the blogosphere." Kerr measures importance, in part, by shared readership and by cross-links between law professors and law students.
Using that standard, I don't recall there ever being a period of great "importance" for law-student weblogs. But something does seem to have changed. In 2002-2004, blogging was still generally undiscovered by the masses. Operating under the radar screen, webloggers of all varieties seemed to have a great deal in common, even law professors and law students. Bloggers were chummier with each other, there was more cross-linking, blogging was less stiff, formal, mature. And it was easier to know about other weblogs--there weren't nearly so many of them.
Even if law-student webloggers haven't changed that much, it's certainly possible that law-professor webloggers are interacting with them differently, chiefly by paying them less attention. This would certainly explain the decline in cross-linking and shared readership that Kerr notes.
It's an interesting debate . . .
people have been saying things like that for years. i started law school in 2005, and was admonished by everyone at law school to delete the rather frank and foul-mouthed blog that i had been keeping for years and years, claiming i'd never be employed if i had it floating around the internet and traceable back to me.
did i shutter it? no. i kept it going. three years and thousands of posts later, i have a JD, a law license...and a job.
Posted by: nicolle | January 30, 2009 at 02:30 PM
I don't think they have changed that much. I question just how many student blogs the faculty were really reading to begin with. None were reading mine. :) And I do think a lot of younger students are using social media (Facebook, etc.) more than blogging. Sign o' the times, I guess.
As for me, I definitely post less than I used to, although I still read a lot of blogs. It had less to do with graduating or employment, and more to do with becoming a dad.
Posted by: Dave! | January 30, 2009 at 03:27 PM
It seems like by "important," they're talking about being substantive. I agree that faculty and practitioners have stepped into that niche, and do it better than law students.
I think you're right that there are just too many law student weblogs out there to keep up. If you're a lawyer, probably the only reason you check out a student blog is to relive the old days or see what the kids are thinking these days. You probably don't stick around long enough to get to know the person, and even if you do, you're not necessarily interested in reading similar content on lots of other student blogs. In the early days of student blogs, there were just a few in a tightly-knit community, and they linked to each other often so there was an ongoing conversation. Now, not so much.
Posted by: CM | January 30, 2009 at 10:13 PM
Silly. Does that law student believe employers don't know about MySpace or Facebook yet?
You can have a professional blog that is an asset to your career (like this one); it's a little harder to have a professional Facebook page. That the person you quoted only thinks of a blog in terms of "here are pictures of me at a beer bash", apparently, says more about their imagination than it does about the future of blogging.
Posted by: mythago | February 03, 2009 at 12:53 AM