“Why I Blog,” by Bill Rice, By Dawn’s Early Light, 15 May 2005, http://dawnsearlylight.blogs.com/del/2005/05/why_i_blog.html.

“Say, sometimes the blog really does piss readers off!,” by Thomas Barnett, Thomas P.M. Barnett :: Weblog, 23 May 2005, http://www.thomaspmbarnett.com/weblog/archives2/001856.html.

I’m going on vacation. In the meantime I will be posting my thesis. Here’s why:

Bill Rice from DEL gives the following reasons for blogging

This blog is a natural progression of engaging in the larger debate, of being a part of something larger than oneself. I have met many extremely competent and intellectually challenging people with high personal integrity in the blogosphere. I am fortunate to have a group of bloggers who are supportive and encouraging. The interaction with all of them has made me a better blogger (with much room to grow) and spawned friendships around the world.

…

This blog will not change the world, but it does have the ability to contribute positively to an important debate, not only here in America, but around the world about freedom, democracy and values. Liberty is dear, and I am thankful for the freedom, paid for at great cost, that I can be a part of this international debate over the future of individual freedoms.

Thomas P.M. Barnett gives a simpler reason

In the end, the blog only has to work for me. The minute that stops is the minute I stop. A simple rule, but it’s the only one that should matter in this very idiosyncratic medium.

My reason would be somewhere in the middle.

I will be out of communication from Friday, May 27th, until Monday, June 6th.

I’ve been considering what to do with tdaxp in the interim for a while. I don’t want it to become static, either for readers who actually care or search engines. I also want it to be useful for me, somehow: for automatic posts to reflect my ideas somehow and maybe even help develop them.

So just not having any posts for 10 days isn’t an option. Nor is just quoting wikipedia articles. I’m too impatient to save interesting (to me) topics until I leave. So then what?

I will post the main section of my thesis — from the table of contents to the bibliography — otherwise known as the first 78 pages (out of a total of 307). Splitting each of the seven chapters up into their constituent sections, this gives about 29 posts, or roughly three a day.

I’ve referenced my thesis four times already (on nations, neural nets, publishing, and banners), so this way I will be able to trackback from it. Additional benefits include

• Additional text may generate some additional search engine hits
  
• Maybe some poor kid somewhere is working on a similar concept, and can use the work
  
• By posting the bibliography, I further thank the sources I used.
  
• Google cache, and maybe even the wayback machine, will give some existance that it actually existed.

Maybe more importantly, a blank blog entry is less intimidating than a blank word processor document. Maybe getting some of the work up here will encourage me to write more on it, and bother with publishing it.

Thank you for your visits. They are appreciated.

Update: In light of Aaron’s guest blogging, I have pre-blogged two posts a day until the first saturday in June. Enjoy!