Yes, I think blogs can indeed make a difference. Thanks to the internet, it is possible to challenge the mighty academy in some way. The currency that ultimately matters though and that gets the attention of ivory-tower scholars is the 'publication' (books and papers) and its acceptability to other scholars. Hopefully, that barrier too will come down. However, my main point was that the academy is not as open-minded and fair or open to criticism as we might think it is and tends to behave like a club. In fact, it does a lot to promote certain theories and block out (or deliberately neglect) and harm what it does not like and does not deserve the naive trust and excessive respect we have for it. It can as a result make change very difficult and slow to come by in some cases and create rapid changes in others to leave behind much animosity and turmoil but little by way of resolution. Many, many scholars are very political with clear biases but dont want to admit it and couch their theories in jargon and style that are seen as respectable and legitimate. In fact, anyone can argue almost for anything as Heehs and Kripal have done. The question is: are the facts, premises and the conclusions correct and to what extent? Unfortunately, after a point, a debate just degerates into a useless exchange of hardened positions presumably because the unenlightened intellect can justify everything as Sri Aurobindo too is quoted as having implied in The Adventure of Consciousness. We can all see the truth of that in our own daily "lives" (no pun intended).