The Eclectic Journal

Gerry McKiernan writes:

Based upon a review of E-journals for my new href=\"http://www.public.iastate.edu/~CYBERSTACKS/EJI.htm\">Web
registry, EJI(sm) I have concluded that the present-day
"Electronic Journal" is evolving to become what I call
"The Eclectic Journal".



By the "Eclectic Journal", I mean a Web-based resource
that at its core provides access to e-journals that offer not
only the conventional content of a digital form of a journal but
also provides or permits interaction with novel and innovative
_features and functionalities_ (e.g., reference linking, cross-publisher
searching, page customization, open peer review, etc.) _AND_
novel and innovative _content_ (e.g., e-Books, pre-publication
history, electronic discussions, translation services, e-prints,
bibliographic databases, etc.)



[SEE EJI(sm) for _several_ more types of various novel and
innovative
features, functionalities, and content *as well as* dozens of specific
examples overall]



Such features, functionalities and content may be integrated
_within_
the e-journal proper or made accessible from the main resource.

Sites that I would consider excellent examples of the "Eclectic
Journals" are



BMJ [British Medical Journal] [ http://www.bmj.com/]

This Electric Journal provides access to a bibliographic
databases

(i.e., Medline), e-prints, reader commentary, reorganized journal
content

(Collected Resources), pre-publication history, etc.] [Free
registration required [?]



The Technical Library of the American Society of Agricultural
Engineers

(ASAE) [ http://asae.frymulti.com/ ]



This Eclectic Journal allows concurrent searching of the

various ASAE publications, notably journal, conference
proceedings,

standards, technical books, and technical meetings)



As source material for a review I am preparing on the "The
Once and

Future Journal" for a special issue of _The Serials
Librarian_

[ http://web.mit.edu/waynej/www/e-access.htm], I am greatly
interested in

identifying Any and All _RECENT_ literature that discusses this

e-publishing phenomena. [I am aware of much of the major and
minor works about the

\'Electronic Journal\' published within the past 50 years]



Recently, I identified two highly-relevant articles that support
my

observations about e-journal evolution:



1- Cox, John. 2000. "The Journal as a provider of community
services,"

__The Serials Librarian_ 38(1/2): 199-209



and



2. Anderson, Kent. 2001. "The Mutant journal: how
adaptations to online

forces are forcing STM journals to mutate," _Learned
Publishing 14(1)

15-22.[http://cherubino.catchword.com/vl=71902383/cl=2/nw=1/rpsv/catchword/alpsp/09531513/v14n1/s3/p15
]



[This article offers a *very* interesting perspective on e-journal

evolution!]

[Thanks Garrett Eastman from the Rowland Institute, Cambridge, MA
for this

reference]



I am also interested in learning of any _additional_ Eclectic
Journal

features, functionalities and/or content that I have _not yet_
established

in EJI(sm) [ http://www.public.iastate.edu/~CYBERSTACKS/EJI.htm]
. I am also

interested in other examples of Any and All novel and innovative
e-journal

features, functionalities, and content for future review and
inclusion



As Always, Any and All contributions, comments, critiques,
queries, cosmic

insights, etc. etc. etc. are Most Welcome.



Regards,



Gerry McKiernan

Eclectic Librarian

Iowa State University

Ames IA 50011



[email protected]



P.S. From my perspective the ACM Digital Library [ http://www.acm.org/dl/]

and the IEEE Explorer [ http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/lpdocs/epic03/
] might

alsobe considered Eclectic Journals as could EiVillage2 [

http://www.ei.org/engineeringvillage2/partners.html or Ei
Engineering

Village

[ http://www.ei.org/eivillage/village.serve_page?p=1280 ]

[What Do You Think?]