A Vote For Blogs: Professor David Albrecht

Reprinted by permission and in its entirety from Professor Albrecht’s blog, The Summa.

A Vote for Blogs

December 20, 2009 by David Albrecht

I’ve been blogging for 15 months now.   Many, though, have been doing it far longer and are much better at it than I.   So much so, that I have taken to allocating time every morning for scrolling down through a list of blogs for comments and updates.  Although I read some for information updating, I really enjoy the editorializing. I try not to subscribe to a lot of e-mail updating, as it really clogs my in-box.

Dan Meyer (Austin Peay) has a blog worth visiting.  His Tick Marks blog on taxation has received a fair amount of recognition.   What I’m emphasizing today, though, is his blogroll.  A blogroll is a list of readable or favorite blogs, usually in the right hand column.  To be included in somone’s blogroll is an honor, as it means your merit a recommendation.   Dan Meyer spends a lot of time on his blogroll, making sure that it is just right.   He has a special class of blogs, though, called the 12 Days of Christmas Blogs. These are in emphasized font (bold) on his blogroll.  Some members of AECM (international e-mail listserv for accounting professors) have reached the exalted status of a 12 Days of Christmas Blog:   Tom Selling’s Accounting Onion, Francine McKenna’s re: The Auditors, and Edith Orenstein’s FEI Blog.   So too, had one candidate for SEC Chief Accountant–Jack Ciesielski’s The AAO Weblog.

If you don’t yet spend much time reading blogs, I recommend that you start. A great way to start is to visit the Tick Marks site and daily click on a smattering of blogs. You’ll be glad you did.

BTW, I have my own blogroll at The Summa.   One of its features is a list of all known blogs of academic accountants. There are over 20 (I hope not to have missed anyone).  I considered having a “best of” section on my blogroll, but decided not to. I don’t want to slight anyone. There are several members of AECM that blog on professional issues, and they all do a great job.

Some accounting/finance blogs get pretty popular (but we aren’t talking about Brittany Spears popular). Popularity is measured in part by hits or traffic.  For example, TaxGirl has 7,000 Twitter followers. I think  tax sites get more traffic, as everyone is affected by taxes.   Many fewer people are affected by financial accounting or auditing, and so these sites get much less traffic.  But then, Francine McKenna’s re: The Auditors gets 150,000 hits per month.  I should be so popular.

Because of the amount of traffic, bloggers have influence.   Published/unpublished papers by academic accountants are sometimes fortunate to be read 25 times (sometimes they get read maybe 50 times). Republishing an academic paper on a popular blog site is a way to increase readership by many times. If increasing and transmitting knowledge is one of our professional responsibilities, then you might consider joining the blogging revolution.   I put an education piece (published in a Clute journal) on my blog, and it has had thousands of hits.  But this e-mail isn’t about me.   Please visit Tick Marks, either to read his posts or to click on his blogroll.  You’ll be glad you did.

I think many blogs are good enough to merit required reading status in your courses.   Although most of my readership comes from professional accounting or regulation, my target audience is always students.

Debit and credit – – David Albrecht