ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
COMMENT
©Copyright 1995 by the American Chemical Society EDITOR
William H. Glaze, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill ASSOCIATE EDITORS
Walter Giger, EAWAG (Europe); Ronald A. Hites, Indiana University; Cass T. Miller, University of North Carolina; Jerald L. Schnoor, University of Iowa (water); John H. Seinfeld, California Institute of Technology (air); Joe Suflita, University of Oklahoma ADVISORY BOARD
Hajime Akimoto, University of Tokyo; Alvin L. Alm, Science Applications International; William L. Budde, EPA Environmental Monitoring Systems Laboratory; Joan M. Daisey, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory; Fritz Frimmel, University of Karlsruhe; Michael R. Hoffmann, California Institute of Technology; Sheila Jasanoff, Cornell University; Richard M. Kamens, University of North Carolina; Michael Kavanaugh, ENVIRON Corporation; M. Granger Morgan, Carnegie Mellon University; Joseph M. Norbeck, University of California Riverside; Dennis Schuetzle, Ford Motor Company; Joanne Simpson, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center; Alexander J.B. Zehnder, EAWAG WASHINGTON EDITORS
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Dilemma: Information Overload
T
wo megatrends in our society are profoundly affecting the scientific publishing business. One is the explosion of information, which shows no sign of abating. The other is the growing complexity of human civilization, which is putting such enormous pressure on people's lives that they have increasingly less time to read and assimilate information. The explosion of scientific information is particularly impressive. For example, the ACS journal Analytical Chemistry is published twice a month, and the Journal of the American Chemical Society and Biochemistry are now published weekly. At Environmental Science & Technology, the number of papers submitted annually has doubled over the past five years and, if my impression is correct, their quality now is at least as good as it was in 1990. Although we are rejecting about the same percentage of papers, the number of pages printed has nearly doubled in five years. Environmental research must be similar to mathematics, a field for which it has been estimated that nearly half of the grand total of 1 million papers in print were published in the past 10 years {Scientific American, Dec. 1994, p. 107). This explosion of information is simply overwhelming all of us, including people interviewed in focus groups last year by ES&T editors and staff. The frustration caused by the avalanche of environmental journals, free material, and intra-institutional paperwork is causing many environmental professionals to read only what they judge to be absolutely necessary. Few people read the journals in their field from cover to cover now as they did when I was in graduate school. Three conclusions seem apparent. First, we must minimize the stress on our readers by printing only important, high-quality information, in both the research and magazine sections. Secondly, we must provide information for all of our constituents in the form that they can use most effectively. Thirdly, we must provide readers with a road map through our publication so that they can quickly find what they want and need to read. In our new format introduced last month, we have attempted to provide such a road map, but this will only relieve the problem incrementally. We must do more. One solution that has been proposed is to publish ES&T in an electronic format that is easily searchable and retrievable. This avenue is particularly appealing to readers who complain that our research papers are too old by the time they are published. Some people even have proposed that journals be replaced by electronic bulletin boards on which all information is posted for the ultimate form of "peer review." We wonder, however, if this is the solution to the information crisis or whether it will lead to further overload. We are convinced that there is a need for editorial discretion, if only to protect our readers from quackery and fraud. Still, it is clear that electronic publishing will provide technological mechanisms to ease the burden on our readers. Many questions remain, however, not the least of which is how the American Chemical Society and other similar publishers can provide hightechnology publishing and stay solvent. With the ACS Publications Division, we are exploring alternatives. As these develop, we will keep you informed.
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William H. Glaze Editor VOL. 29, NO. 2, 1995 / ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY • 6 3 A