Has anyone been following this?

http://100rsns.blogspot.com/

It's a quite lengthy list that dissects the failure of the PhD model, mainly in a US context, but also highly applicable here. There seems to be quite a bit of anti-PhDing at the moment, and there was even an article in the economist about why doing a PhD is a waste of time.

http://www.economist.com/node/17723223

I completely see where they are coming from and even though I am not as bad off as I used to be I probably have to (secretly) admit my PhD was a bit of a waste. Its just interesting to see I am not alone in that feeling.

BadHair,

Thank you or those too. Now I shall have to finish the bottle opened earlier...!

Dafydd

Yeah,

thanks a lot. It was exactly what I needed now. After a year working myself to death and having produced nothing.

It's easy for me to say it now, while I'm just finishing off and haven't experienced years of not being able to find a suitable position, but I don't think I'll ever regret my PhD- I really have enjoyed it and have learnt so much more in addition to the academic stuff. I might live to regret saying that, but I don't think I will. Of course I'll be incredibly frustrated and hacked off if I can't find a job, but it's been such a good experience in so many ways that I'll still be glad I did it. Even when I'm working at Tesco ;) KB

On a slightly more optimistic note, but equally thought provoking was this self assessment questionnaire asking Have you got what it takes to to have an academic career?

http://www.academiccareer.manchester.ac.uk/foryou/phd/whatittakes/

I am glad to see that Manchester have started to be more open about the process and I think having this kind of information available is essential for people to start asking questions and to protect themselves.