Bobrow.PA@PARC-MAXC.ARPA@sri-unix.UUCP (09/20/83)
Changes in the Artificial Intelligence Journal
Daniel G. Bobrow (Editor-in-chief)
There have been a number of changes in the Artificial Intelligence
Journal which are of interest to the AI community.
1) The size of the journal is increasing. In 1982, the journal was
published in two volumes of three issues each (about 650 printed
pages per year). In 1983, we increased the size to two volumes of
four issues each (about 900 printed pages per year). In order to
accomodate the increasing number of high quality papers that are
being submitted to the journal, in 1984 the journal will be published
in three volumes of three issues each (about 1000 printed pages per
year).
2) Despite the journal size increase, North Holland will maintain the
current price of $50 per year for personal subscriptions for
individual (non-institutuional) members of major AI organizations
(e.g. AAAI, SIGART). To obtain such a subscription, members of such
organizations should send a copy of their membership acknowledgement,
and their check for $50 (made out to Artificial Intelligence) to:
Elsevier Science Publishers
Attn: John Tagler
52 Vanderbilt Avenue
New York, New York 10017
North Holland (Elsevier) will acknowledge receipt of the request for
subscription, provide information about which issues will be included
in your subscription, and when they should arrive. Back issues are
not available at the personal rate.
3) The AIJ editorial board has recognized the need for good review
articles in subfields of AI. To encourage the writing of such
articles, an honorarium of $1000 will be awarded the authors of any
review accepted by the journal. Although review papers will go
through the usual review process, when accepted they will be given
priority in the publication queue. Potential authors are reminded
that review articles are among the most cited articles in any field.
4) The publication process takes time. To keep an even flow of
papers in the journal, we must maintain a queue of articles of about
six months. To allow people to know about important research results
before articles have been published, we will lists of papers accepted
for publication in earlier issues of the journal, and make such lists
available to other magazines (e.g. AAAI magazine, SIGART news).
5) New book review editor: Mark Stefik has taken the job of book
review editor for the Artificial Intelligence Journal. The following
note from Mark describes his plans to make the book review section
much more active than it has been in the past.
------------------
The Book Review Section of the Artificial Intelligence Journal
Mark Stefik - Book Review Editor
I am delighted for this opportunity to start an active review column
for AI, and invite your suggestions and participation.
This is an especially good time to review work in artificial
intelligence. Not only is there a surge of interest in AI, but there
are also many new results and publications in computer science, in
the cognitive sciences and in other related sciences. Many new
projects are just beginning and finding new directions (e.g., machine
learning, computational linguistics), new areas of work are opening
up (e.g., new architectures), and others are reporting on long term
projects that are maturing (computer vision). Some readers will want
to track progress in specialized areas; others will find inspiration
and direction from work breaking outside the field. There is enough
new and good but unreviewed work that I would like to include two or
three book reviews in every issue of Artificial Intelligence.
I would like this column of book reviews to become essential
reading for the scientific audience of this journal. My goal is to
cover both scientific works and textbooks. Reviews of scientific
work will not only provide an abstract of the material, but also show
how it fits into the body of existing work. Reviews of textbooks
will discuss not only clarity and scope, but also how well the
textbook serves for teaching. For controversial work of major
interest I will seek more than one reviewer.
To get things started, I am seeking two things from the
community now. First, suggestions of books for review. Books
written in the past five years or so will be considered. The scope
of the fields considered will be broad. The main criteria will be
scientific interest to the readership. For example, books from as
far afield as cultural anthropology or sociobiology will be
considered if they are sufficiently relevent, and readable by an AI
audience. Occasionally, important books intended for a popular
audience will also be considered.
My second request is for reviewers. I will be asking
colleagues for reviews of particular books, but will also be open
both to volunteers and suggestions. Although I will tend to solicit
reviews from researchers of breadth and maturity, I recognize that
graduate students preparing theses are some of the best read people
in specialized areas. For them, reviews in Artificial Intelligence
will be a good way to to share the fruits of intensive reading in
thesis preparation, and also to achieve some visibility. Reviewers
will receive a personal copy of the book reviewed.
Suggestions will reach me at the following address.
Publishers should send two copies of works to be reviewed.
Mark Stefik
Knowledge Systems Area
Xerox Palo Alto Research Center
3333 Coyote Hill Road
Palo Alto, California 94304
ARPANET Address: STEFIK@PARC