CEIC NOTES AND COMMENTS : THE STORY OF ONE JOURNAL
Once upon a time, back in 1987 to be specific, a new journal came on the scene called K-Theory. The publisher was D. Reidel, a member of the Kluwer Academic Publishers Group. The managing editor was Anthony Bak, who wrote in the editorial in the first issue, "K-theory is a new discipline of mathematics embracing concepts and problems central to many other major disciplines of mathematics. The aim of this journal is to provide a forum for the presentation, discussion, and critical evaluation of significant advances in the mathematical sciences which are related to K-theory."
The editorial continues over several pages to provide an overview of the progress of this field, and its relations to other subjects. Life was apparently good for this new journal; the subscription price was only about $150/year. Surely several hundred libraries subscribed in the initial years, even though maintenance of large lists of journal subscriptions was challenging for most.
During the next years, lots of interesting developments took place in mathematical publishing. New journals started. New electronic only journals started. E-mail and web servers for preprints became more common. Bertelsmann acquired Springer. Cinven and Candover bought Bertelsmann Springer and merged it with Kluwer, yielding Springer Science+Business Media.
Then, eventually, life was less good perhaps for some journals. Editorial boards became restive for a variety of reasons. For the K-theory of our story, there was frustration in the relationship with Springer. Eventually, the journal bolted away from Springer. One account of this period is provided by Wolfgang Lueck for the DMV Mitteillungen. (http://www.math.uni-muenster.de/u/lueck/publ/lueck/dmv_mitteilungen_lueck_en...)
Enter now, Cambridge U Press, which offered to publish such a journal under the new title Journal of K-theory. The editorial board re-formed at CUP with the content owned by privately held corporation, ISOPP.
In the meantime, legal actions cropped up which eventually led Springer to cease serving any of the K-theory content. In one of the very few instances recognizing an emergency (trigger event) for journal access, the archival service Portico began supplying the journal?s backfile through libraries who subscribe to Portico service. The backfile would not otherwise be legally available.
Unfortunately, there is repetition in our story. Once again, editorial displeasure has led this journal's board to cut ties with CUP. CUP has announced on its web site that it will no longer publish "JKT" after Volume 14, Issue 3.
The K-theory community is now organizing around a foundation structure. See http://www.ktheoryfoundation.org/ for details. And an arrangement with Mathematical Sciences Publishers (MSP) will bring out a new title, Annals of K-theory, owned and governed by the foundation.
One might well hope that our story has a happy end in this way. Surely this reminds us that the community should not be divorced from the governance and running of its journals. And it shows how vulnerable we may be when we rely upon electronic versions. Ingrid Daubechies, Past-President of IMU, once stated that she would like to see each journal have its own "society". Quoting her, "I propose that from their present disenfranchised situation, our existing journals be allowed to incorporate, and become independent societies". Perhaps this story underscores her idea.
Carol Hutchins, Member of the Committee on Electronic Information and Communication (CEIC)