In 2021, a group of doctoral researchers at GEOMAR was considering the idea of creating a blog for young marine scientists to share their research and experiences with a wider audience. I joined them in early 2022, when it had progressed from an idea to a project and a lot of decisions had to be made. Which platform should we use? What should be our focus, the target audience? What are our legal responsibilities? And what about a logo or some sort of corporate design? After a final push, our first blog post went online in July 2022.

Now, 3.5 years, 44 regular and 15 FYORD travel blogs later, it is time to say goodbye. The reason is simple: We are all finishing our time at GEOMAR and CAU and are unable to find interested successors. Running a blog is much more than just writing a story every month. Behind the scenes, we were recruiting authors, brainstorming new topics, creating illustrations or searching for legally usable ones online, and (re-) organising our workflow and data structure. When authors were found, we reminded them of deadlines, motivated them, proofread their drafts, reminded them of deadlines, sorted their pictures, reminded them of deadlines and finally typeset everything in wordpress on this platform. There were times when we did not have a topic the day before publishing. We faced technical issues and authors who bailed last minute. On the other hand, searching for people with interesting experiences and helping them to write down their story can be quite fulfilling. We gave PhDs and Post-Docs, but also university and school students, a platform to voice their opinions and expertise, and I think we can be quite proud of ourselves.

So, thank you to all of our authors, who have contributed, the many fluctuating members in the editorial team, as well as you, the readers, for being interested in what we have to say.

“So long and thanks for all the fish!”

Elisa
in the name of the editorial team

PS: The published blogs will stay online. If anyone feels up to the task of continuing this blog, we would be happy to hand it over.