For academics anyway. After nearly 3 months of this blog “experiment,” I find the reaction to it among academics to be curiosity and skepticism. The academic world is very conservative and has long shunned “opinion.” So blogging and social networking stretch the imagination in ways that academics find uncomfortable. I am personally excited by the possibilities, especially for landscape architecture – and for landscape architecture in the university setting. I think this media offers some interesting possibilities for linking multiple worlds – professional practice, academia, those in developing and in developed countries, etc. Outside of the university, these possibilities are well-known. I take comfort in the fact that at least one well-known Nobel Prize winner spends a little time each day blogging. Good company!
With relatively little advertising (mostly emails to people I know), this blog has received several thousand page views since it went online. That is encouraging, and I hope to keep the content frequently updated even as the hectic semester gets underway. What is less exciting is that I am finding the blog format to NOT be particularly interactive (through reader comments). It would be great if the number of comments increases over time! Otherwise, the potential of this media would seem to be more limited than it could be. I hope that readers are finding interesting and useful information here! Thank you for stopping by.
Praxis in Landscape Architecture 
It seems academics generally and “scientist academics”in particular are reluctant to admit any ideas that do not stem from related prior research, and more suspect, especially if they come from outside the academic domain, I for one am not perturbed, while not belittling the contributions of science to our modern world, mostly the interesting applications of what they discover arises from the cray ideas of people who barely understand the science, but are able to creatively visualize its potential and communicate it to others.
I hope you carry on your blogging experiment and regrettably i am one of those who read but don’t always engage in the discourse, hopefully a more open and intuitive platform will be forthcoming in the near future – in the meantime Thanks for posting. Donovan Gillman
It definitely takes time to generate discussion, so I wouldn’t be too discouraged with that front. I find that when I talk to people off-line that certain topics and posts are generating discussion in firms or other circles unbeknownst to me, and that people often-times don’t discuss on the site… Kind of like reading a magazine – how many folks actually take the time to write editorials? I think it’s a tough format for dialogue (i rarely comment on others sites), and often just becomes polarized positions. But the ideas thrown out there do actually have a ripple effect far beyond what you see.
The disconnect with academia is that blogs imply a lack of rigor – and that they are not valid sources of information and data. This is true to a point, as there is a process of dissemination along a continuum that moves from quick ideas that are more opinion and less able to be vetted, to more formalized research or discussion, to peer reviewed journal articles. The problem is that is we only look at the most rigorous research as valid, we alienate a significant portion of the actors within these realms (notably professionals) by implying that only hard research matters… when one of the issues is we don’t discuss or reflect enough as landscape architects on many issues.
It creates further distance between the interlocking pieces of the profession. If academics don’t feel like conversing or informally discussing ideas and concepts – which would perhaps be more interesting and accessible to practitioners – then we miss an opportunity for sharing and common ground. This gap leads to less relevance between theory and praxis, academic research and professional work. This is unfortunate because we need to strengthen the connections between the two not further it more. The idea of accessible and less rigid dialogue, while perhaps less methodological, makes it easier for practice to tap into current research, and gives a more applicable context for researchers to frame their study in terms that are useful to increasing the quality and relevance of our collective work.
Keep on blogging! It’s great to see more landscape architecture related sources out there – which are also providing great visibility to the profession as a whole!