One of the blogs I’ve really valued over the years was written by a pseudonymous academic blogger called DrugMonkey, but for two months the Monkey’s blog has been silent.
Has he called it a day? Dropped the mic after successfully having big impact?
What’s the deal?
After many years could it be that the DrugMonkey decided to move on to focus on other things? He provided valuable, no-B.S. perspectives on science and in particular on NIH funding. There was also the occasional post on the science of drugs that gave that blog and blogger his name.
One of the commenter’s on DrugMonkey’s last post, many of whom have been lamenting the possibility of the end of that blog, noted that he is still very active on Twitter.
Maybe he’ll be back to the blog eventually?
DrugMonkey’s disappearance from his blog has made me think more about my own blog. I’ve been at this blog more than 7 years and on the web with various websites for about a decade. You can read more about my web history here. If DrugMonkey is done or even just taking a blog sabbatical, I’m curious what was the deciding factor.
I still find the educational outreach on this blog to be a meaningful, positive thing to do despite being crazy busy overall. While there are many potential or even concrete risks, especially for me blogging as myself by name about often controversial subjects including reporting on stem cell clinics that have at times even threatened me, I continue to feel strongly about keeping this effort going.
Love your blog, Paul. I wish other scientists would blog like this.
Thanks, Kristen. It’s great to get feedback and support.
Paul
Thanks for what you do Paul. Because this is such an involved and varied field it is really appreciated by people like myself, Joe Public, to have a scientist’s perspectives. This arena is fraught with credibility issues so thank you for factual blogging.
Paul,
I’m not familiar with “Drug Monkey”, but FYI I’ve decided to stop writing my articles and my blog. After my last article was published in Jan. 2016 (on Gene Editing), I decided to take a break from writing, and now, after more than a year, I find that I don’t have the energy I once had to write and publish over 300 articles. So, came to the conclusion that unless some subject really calls out to me, I’ll leave the writing to you younger guys.
Best regards,
Irv