This book outlines the consequences of digitization for peer-reviewed research articles published in electronic journals. It is argued that digitization will revolutionize scientific communication. However, this study shows that this is not the case where scientific journals are concerned. Authors make little use of the possibilities offered by the digital medium; electronic peer review procedures have not replaced traditional ones, and users have not embraced new forms of interaction offered by some electronic journals.

Zusammenfassung

1. The birth of the electronic journal In the autumn of 1987 Michael Ehringhaus and Bird Stasz of Syracuse U- versity launched New horizons in adult education, probably the very rst ref- 1 ereed scienti c journal to be published in electronic form ( g. 1. 1). The rst issue was sent over the Adult Education Network (AEDNET). The journal still 2 exists today. In March 1991 Ted Jennings of the University at Albany (State 3 University of New York) launched EJournal, described as an 'electronic jo- nal concerned with the implications of electronic networks and texts' ( g. 1. 2), coining the now popular term e-journal. The Online journal of current cli- cal trials, published from September 1991, has been described as the rst peer 45 reviewed electronic journal in medicine. How signi cant is the phenomenon of the scienti c electronic journaltoday, more than a decade and a half after its introduction? Over this period inf- mation and communication technologies (ICT) have been an important factor in the development of scienti c communication. Applications such as c- munication over digital networks (converging towards a single network the Internet), the use of computerized systems for creating, storing and retrieving 1 The scienti c journal is also referred to as 'scholarly' or 'research' journal. We use the former term in this study. 2 Although no longer distributed over AEDNET but through the World Wide Web. The rst issue is now ? available at http://www. nova. edu/ aed/horizons/vol1n1.

Inhalt
THE DEVELOPMENT OF SCIENTIFIC COMMUNICATION.- THE SCIENTIFIC COMMUNICATION SYSTEM.- THE DIGITIZATION OF INFORMATION RESOURCES.- THE ELECTRONIC JOURNAL 1987-2004.- DIGITIZATION AND THE EVOLUTION OF SCIENTIFIC COMMUNICATION.