Historical background and formal status of ETAI
How it got started
Although the discussion about a European-based journal for
artificial intelligence has gone on for a very long time,
the debate took a new turn through an evening session at
the ECAI conference in Budapest in August, 1996, and at
the subsequent meeting of the ECCAI trustees (consisting
of representatives of all members societies). The conclusion
from those meetings was that there is an active interest
in starting a new publication scheme which is based on
electronic publication over the Internet, but which differs
from conventional journals not only with respect to the
medium of transmission (paper vs. Internet), but also with
respect to how the submission and refereeing process is
organized.
Based on the discussion at those meetings, Erik Sandewall
undertook to write a concrete proposal for how the new
publication medium could be organized. The ECCAI board
discussed an interims proposal in November, 1996, and
proposed that the new periodical should be called the
Electronic Transactions on Artificial Intelligence.
A further detailed proposal,
The ECCAI system for specialized research publication,
was accepted by the ECCAI board
in January, 1997 as the basis for the new enterprise.
In brief, the proposal is to have two periodicals with
different profiles. The Electronic Transactions for
Artificial Intelligence (ETAI) will be a vehicle for
publication within specialized areas, such as
terminological languages, automatic deduction,
induction-based learning, or reasoning about actions and
change -- areas where there is a distinct community of
participating researhers, and where many research papers are
written for other researchers within the same niche.
A review board consisting of expert researchers
within each specialized area will guarantee the quality of
ETAI publications.
Conversely, the Artificial Intelligence Communications
(AICOM) will continue to appear with limited subscriptions
from ECCAI member societies. It will publish high-quality
scientific articles and other scientific material which is
of interest to a broad range of researchers within
artificial intelligence.
The ETAI will primarily use electronic publication. It will
also introduce another innovation, namely posteriori
reviewing - articles are first published, then reviewed
and (if they pass) they obtain certification as a quality
stamp. The first publication occurs in separate
first publication archives, similar to "preprint
archives" but with a guarantee of persistence. The details
of the proposal are in the memo mentioned above.
A related article,
A
Neo-Classical Structure for Scientific Publication and
Reviewing contains a more detailed explanation and
rationale of the reviewing scheme which is proposed to be
used for the ETAI (Electronic Transactions on Artificial
Intelligence).
Formal status
- The ETAI is published under the auspices of the
European Coordinating Committee for
Artificial Intellligence (ECCAI). The ECCAI appoints a
policy
committee for the ETAI.
- ETAI's professional activities (reviewing and colloquia) is
organized through its scientific areas. Each
scientific area is led by an area editor and
an area editorial board. The choice of areas and
the appointment of area editors is done by the policy committee.
Please consult ETAI's main web page
for a list of current ETAI scientific areas, their editors and
area editorial boards.
- The policy committee also appoints ETAI's editor-in-chief
who is in charge of general matters, including the development of
the publication layer, contacts with First Publication Archives,
arrangements for the graphical form and paper publication of ETAI
accepted articles, and software support including bibliographic
support. Please see the ETAI publication page
for details about these matters.
- The Electronic Transactions on Artificial Intelligence is being
registered formally as a periodical that is issued in two editions:
an electronic, on-line edition and a paper edition. Details are to
follow.
- Each of the ETAI scientific areas operates a Newsletter
which is recommended to be issued about once a month. Each of these
Newsletters exists in an on-line edition. Optionally, a Newsletter
may also appear in a paper edition and be formally registered as a
periodical. This applies at present for:
In all cases, such Newsletters are the responsibility of the respective
area editor.
Erik Sandewall
20-Feb-98 13:22