Looking around Ozplogistan, I have two contradictory impressions. On the one hand, the place is so busy and exciting that it’s impossible to keep up with everything that’s going on, let alone to keep the blogroll up to date. For example, I only just realised that I’d left out Tim Lambert and Chris Sheil.
On the other hand, I look around and wonder “where is everybody?”. In the last year or so, most of those I regarded at the time as constituting “my corner of the blogosphere” have moved on. Don Arthur was the first to give the game away, and despite some incisive comments here and there, he hasn’t been lured back. Jason Soon and Ken Parish have both taken a back seat in the collective blogs they founded – I still read both regularly, but with less occasion for cross-linking and debate. More recently, Gareth Parker and Scott Wickstein have taken indefinite breaks. Of my old inner circle, only Rob Corr and Tim Dunlop are still going strong (Rob Schaap continues his tradition of erratic, but often brilliant, blogging).
I guess this says something about the time and energy required for blogging. When big life events come along, or when you just get tired, blogging is an obvious candidate for cutbacks. It looks as though the average lifespan for a blog may turn out to be something like eighteen months (coincidentally or not, almost exactly the combined age of this blog and its predecessor).
However, I’m still having fun, and plan to keep on blogging. I’m still thinking about changes in the setup, maybe including a change of name, and I may make more contributions to group blogs, but the basic pattern isn’t going to change any time soon.
I realise I haven’t mentioned commenters yet, but you are a vital part of blogging for me, especially as the blogosphere becomes more diverse and diffuse. So thanks everyone for another great year of comments
Happy New Year (a day or two early) to everybody!
John Quiggin 
And the other impression, which contradicts the first is? Or is this a Zen thing?
It’s the first hand clapping. Second should be coming in any time now.
my new…but still just as erratic blog has been up at badanalysis.com/blog
if you get round to updating your blog roll…not that it really merits it…but anyhoo…
maybe ill get back to blogging lots if i become a uni student again next year…
JQ,
long may your blogging continue.
For those of us not blessed with the time management skiills you possess it is a pleasure to read a blog with whom I probably disagree with more than I agree with because of the thoughful way you present issues.
I also appreciate the moderate language you use.
May 2004 be even better than 2003
John, as one of those phantoms who always read but rarely comment, thanks for a great blog, hope it continues to be as enjoyable for you as it has been for the readers.
Happy New Year, from back here in the USA!
Likewise; Australia.
Thanks for blogrolling me! It’s almost a year since I started, so I guess I have another six months to go.
I’m sort of blogging still but mostly doing the sports stuff now.
Please do keep it up, John. Your blog is a daily treat and an indispensible benchmark for quality in this medium.
From an unseasonably warm Hungary, Happy New Year to you and all the Quigginites.
And blushing Happiest of New Years to you, maestro..
It is perhaps worth pointing out in the general wash of unspecific good vibes that JQ is not only an extremely good weblog-and-opinion-piece writer, but fast approaching the status of being a genuine giant of the economics profession.
For example, many economists would have been happy to have built an entire career out of Rank-Dependent Expected Utility Theory. It’s a mark of Prof. Quiggin’s intellectual stature that
a) this is just one of a number of research areas for him and
b) he invented the entire theory, solving a problem that had stumped quite prominent researchers, in an undergraduate thesis!
Prof. Q has made pretty big contributions to asset pricing as well, without even touching on agricultural economics (which last time I looked, he regarded as his main field). If he wasn’t working out of the “arse end of nowhere” ([c] Paul Keating), nobody wuld give a toss about Krugman. I’d guess that, going by journal citations, he’s either the most prominent academic blogging today, or damn close.
Face it, nobody here except me appreciates this blog on as many different levels. If you want to start to understand the layers of nuance, here’s a decent introductory text.
That’s very kind of you, Daniel. If I ever need a nomination for anything, I’ll come to you :-).
DS:
With all the “Prof Q.”, bulleted points, and erm, unique writing style, that post wouldn’t happen to be a parody (tribute) to Jack S would it? 🙂
As for JQ, he’s certainly the most prominant Australian economic blogger (prolly ’cause he is the only Australian economic blogger, afaik).
Actually Jason Soon is an economist as well; but he’s not as prolific as John.
happy new year and best wishes to Prof Q and the rest of Ozplogistan. I second Daniel Davies’ comments, having come to appreciate Prof. Q’s many intellectual talents.
In response to Scott W and Prof Q, I have indeed taken a back seat in my blogging since early Oct when I met my vegetarian-greenie-musician-Jewish-atheist GF (seriously).
heh…that calls for a curve…
independant axis: girlfriend time…
dependant axis: blogging time…
(shite, is that why i’ve had two posts in 6 months)