IUCr forums

Dear Colleagues,

Sadly, still no discussion has developed on this forum concerning the journals review, so here is my two-penneth worth on possibilities for the journals, as I am not a member of the review committee. I don't have a flash of genius here, and much of what follows has probably been thought of already, but here is my input. My comments are mainly relevant to the B/C/E farm.

To raise the profile and visibility of the journals...
Include review articles.
Invite scientific comment articles.

Have more special issues. We have started virtual special issues at C, which seems to have worked well for the first one and more are being planned.

Pick a hot new area to focus on and start something there (e.g. new journal or refocus an existing one). I am unsure if trying to compete now with the likes of CrystEngComm and J. Cryst. Growth & Design is really going to yield results in the short term at least, as they are well established.

Give the journals attractive names. Acta X is rather bland these days, particularly perhaps to the non-specialists who are publishing structural work.

It is possible that some people (I am thinking mainly of structural scientists here) see the Acta journals as "by crystallographers for crystallographers", so are frightened to dabble when they feel they are not a "real" crystallographer. And now that very many structural investigations are done these days by "lay" crystallographers, perhaps those people feel more comfortable publishing in a journal produced by a chemistry publisher, hence the popularity of CrystEngComm, etc. How do we combat that? Renaming journals might help.

Make the web site much more attractive. The journls.iucr.org home page with just plain links to all the journals is very bland and unenticing, so one might think what lies beneath is also not very exciting. Already at this level, two or three of the hottest current articles from some of the journals (not necessarily all journals have to be represented at the same time) might be presented here. Other journals do that and while some sites are messy and hard to navigate as a result, I am sure a well-designed layout could be achieved and yet be enticing.

While high impact journals are obviously good to have, we should not cast aside a good role the IUCr is providing in facilitating publication of lesser articles of a more archival nature. To this end I mean E. It is certainly popular with certain segments of the community and provides an obviously needed avenue for such work to be published.

A number of good authors became disillusioned with C following the steps taken in the late 1990s to downsize the journal (its size was financially unsustainable at that time). Standards were raised to do this, but that did not sit well with parts of the community. Many have probably been lost permanently. Maybe we could try to focus on attracting the younger generation now; how?

Best wishes,
Tony

Dear Tony and All
It seems a bit too innocent to me to seek advice on the topics to be raised. After all, we had many hours of discussion (and piles of reports) on Journal matters lately. There is also ample documentation on our El Escorial meeting on the web.I would rightfully be blamed to ignore your competence if I would structure and/or limit the input (not complaints - I think a have a broad knowledge of most of our problems and the problems of scientific publishing in general) that is currently required from you. Your ideas and opinions (beyond speculation) would be appropriate now. The special committee to deal with the future of the Journals appointed by the Executive Committee (EC) will deliver a report to the EC, and I will make sure that there will be time for discussion among us before any decisions are made. So far, the input via our forum has been zero; I agree that this is unexpected and disappointing but there is no use to re-pose again and again the same questions. Instead, please say where you see a promising route to further success for our Journals. There should not be any doubt that others including me have heard and even developed certain ideas (in fact many over the last several decades!)that may be evaluated, but my position would be stronger if I could refer to direct votes received from you. Time is short.
With all good wishes, especially for this new year,
Gernot

Dear Gernot and colleagues,

Gernot opened this forum on 9.12.11, but no-one, absolutely no-one, has posted anything to it. We are all busy with many things and Christmas has intervened. But I think that if a discussion is to take place on the important issues being investigated by the journals review committee, someone needs to initiate it, otherwise we all go off and do some other pressing task each day. I suggest either Gernot or someone from the review committee itself would be the best starters of a discussion. Tell us what ideas are being thrown around and maybe we can give input of pros and cons, how those ideas might function in practice, etc. At the moment, I do not have specific ideas or comments to make (other than the general concern of the quality and difficulty of obtaining referee responses), but if we know what is being thought of, maybe this sparks ideas to contribute.

So far, I have not been contacted by anyone on that committee and I am wondering if we are going to be presented with a fait-acomplit without any journal editors being consulted. The journal editors are those who often know of the ease or practical challenges of introducing new ideas that might look good on paper, but may be quite a different thing in the field. Gernot said: "It is thus very appropriate that any ideas, worries and suggestions you may have should be taken into account". But I think the initial questions need to come from the committee, otherwise there is the temptation just to sit back and stay with the status quo.

Yes, I am being provocative here, but let's not miss the opportunity. As far as I know, the committee has to report in the next month or two. Gautam's remarks in the latest IUCr Newsletter are also pertinent.

Best wishes to all.
Tony

Dear colleagues and friends
It seems timely and useful to open a discussion forum for the
(Section and Main) Editors of all our eight IUCr Journals. Of course,
each Journal is free to have its own forum including all Co-editors
(and me!). Requests should be sent to Peter Strickland. The forum we
are opening here should help us to interact more frequently on issues
of interest across the journal boundaries. There are many reasons to
be concerned about the future of scientific publishing and as you
know, the Executive Committee has set up a special committee to look
at our Journals with the mission to report any conclusions early next
year. It is thus very appropriate that any ideas, worries and
suggestions you may have should be taken into account. Anything you
want to raise should be submitted as a 'post'. I will act as a moderator and,
depending on the items received, define 'topics' out of an initial and
probably persisting 'miscellaneous' bucket. Access to this forum should be
exclusive to Editors and, of course, Chester staff. The IUCr by-laws
also imply that the President, as an ex-officio member of all
Commissions, could get involved on all levels.
Please use this new tool so we can contribute to the well-being of
the IUCr Journals.
With all good wishes,
Gernot Kostorz