There are hundreds of scholarly journals published online, plenty of them free. But what makes Museum Anthropology Review’s launch notable is that it is being led by the same editor as the traditional journal, Museum Anthropology, using the exact same peer review system. For years, the criticism of the free, online model has been that it would be impossible for it to replicate the quality control offered by traditional publishing. When online journal publishers have boasted of their quality control, print loyalists have said, in effect, “well maybe it’s good, but it can’t be as good as what we’re doing.”
To this subjective criticism, open access advocates can now point to someone who knows exactly what the standards are at both journals, as he’s leading them both. And while the professor has set up the journal with his own university library, this project isn’t focused on one university’s scholarship, but the best articles in the field — again, precisely the model that makes the best journals vital to scholars.
Scott Jaschik, Abandoning Print, Not Peer Review, February 28, 2008
Museum Anthropology Review: http://museumanthropology.net/
For those who want a quick summary of a few of the things that we anticipate will become extinct in coming years:
2009: Mending things
2014: Getting lost
2016: Retirement
2019: Libraries
2020: Copyright
2022: Blogging, Speleeng, The Maldives
2030: Keys
2033: Coins
2036: Petrol engined vehicles
2037: Glaciers
2038: Peace & Quiet
2049: Physical newspapers, Google
Beyond 2050: Uglyness, Nation States, DeathThe Extinction Timeline project collaboration was sparked by Richard Watson’s original idea, invigorated by a couple of wines over a Future Exploration Network celebratory lunch.
Ross Dawson, Trends in the Living Networks,October 2007
As far as I can tell, printed academic journals are not on this list, although i think they belong there too. I also suspect keys will be gone before libraries, but i am not so certain. Also, I hope the coins go earlier than petrol engines.
