Plenary Session Presentations

Electronic review of papers

As academics, I think we are often being taken advantage of by the publishers of scientific journals. They charge us for submitting papers. They charge us for publishing papers in their journals. They charge us for the reprints and subscripions to their journals, and they charge even more for institutional subscription to their journals. And yet, we review papers for them for free, giving them free time, and paying for the cost of fax and other expenses. I do not mind that much if I were doing that for the journals sponsored by non-profit organizations such as American Heart Association, but I do not think it is right when we are dealing with publishing companies who are genertaing profits at our expense. I for one would like to see the electronic version of scientific journals, using a similar peer review system, but without the current cost burdens of these publishing companies. The electronic version should be accessible to everyone, so that we can achieve the goal of giving universal access to everyone on scientific discoveries. This present Internet Congress is a good start in that direction. I think we should start our own internet journals.

Tue Dec 15