and the reason I say that is because it is a much more interesting and fruitful question.
why do they? we know why, in academia, people reply to nearly any criticisms from someone within academia: to not reply is to fail to do your duty as a scholar.
but they aren't all academics, though all trained as academics.
why are they appearing to import the rules of academia to blogging? isn't blogging rather different? or are they just trying toextend academia to bloglandia? really?
why do the rules about who must repond to criticism work in academia? what purpose do they serve?
is there something abotu blogging that's different?
i think there is, and if they got at those issues, they'd probably actually have been able to pursue a truly radical critique of knowledge production in and out of academia. i'd think this would be especially important for fisher who (talk about self absorbed criticisms of academia!) seems obsessed with why academia is so horrid for all involved. he appears to want to build something outside academia, and yet seems wedded to its norms and doesn't really know it.
shag