Ken Heidemann, Director of Publications, AMS

• The AMS is in a transition time period. We've mastered paper-based workflow and reduced the time from submission to publication. The trend is toward an all-electronic workflow, which started in 2004. This has required a capital expenditure for training and allowances for a learning curve.
• As of this year (2005) Sheridan Press will publish print for the AMS and Allen Press will handle online only.
• In 2004, 1450 papers were accepted for publication compared to 1150 in 2001. Submissions have increased during this transition time, having a huge impact on staff. As a result, production times are up a bit, but the worst is over.
• Some new tools for members coming soon: members will be able to create personalized online libraries, customize the articles they want to see, and will be able to see who is citing their papers.
• The AMS business model will need to change but the AMS values ASLI comments on the new structure.
• What's going to happen to paper? Is it going to go away? Should we kill it? Ken's opinion: paper is vital and should not go away.
• But the problem is this: 62% of institutional subscribers are print-only with no online access. The AMS must give libraries an incentive to include online access.
• The AMS Council has forbidden any divergence from print and online versions of their journals, believing that print should not become an inferior product to electronic.
• 62% of subscribers only subscribe to one journal, not all.
• What does ASLI think about the future of print? 1) ASLI members report that younger scientists use electronic, older scientists like both; 2) ASLI members are worried about online archiving (will online archiving last?); 3) what does perpetual access mean? Can it mean access to backfiles via CD?? This is unacceptable. What if the company goes bankrupt and there is no print, and then no access??

Jeff Rosenfeld, Editor, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, AMS

• Jeff reports that he is very paper oriented.
• BAMS is the membership magazine of the AMS but it is also a highly cited journal in the field. The AMS is wedded to maintaining a product that represents the society to all people. As such, BAMS has a broad role to play because of diverse readers - from professionals in the field to high school students.
• The print version of BAMS is probably here to stay. Jeff acknowledges that a lot of what's in BAMS is not online. BAMS is a member benefit, yet is available free online; you do not want to give away all of your content for free when it is a member benefit. The AMS could put all of BAMS content up a year later so that it is available at some point.
• Jeff states that ASLI members can be contributors to BAMS as book reviewers, to the May book section or possibly to coordinate book awards.

Return to 2005 Conference Program and Minutes.

ASLI webmaster
Last update: August 1, 2007