Electronic publishing: technical constraints with policy consequences

This paper reviews the impact of two convergent trends in publication; the growth of 'electronic dissemination' through bodies such as Social Science Electronic Publishing, and the increasing electronic presence of normal journals. It assesses the prospects and difficulties surrounding emergent projects of fully-electronic refereed publications such as the new journal of the Society for Non-Linear Economic Dynamics. It discusses a project, current at the time, to convert the annual proceedings of a regular economics conference into a refereed electronic publication, and review the issues governing choice of medium, editorial standards and procedures, citation, authentication and copyright. This project subsequently matured into the refereed online journal Critique of Political Economy (COPE) [www.copejournal.org]