Should scientific journals be printed? A personal view

Although the widely appreciated advantages of electronic journals in the sc iences would indicate that they should be the preferred form of publication , they persist in print as well. The data on the relative use of bound and unbound journals in an academic biology library suggest that almost all of the journals studied are suitable as electronic only; only a very few are r easonable choices in both print and electronic formats. Most scientific art icles might be better suited for publication not in journals at all, but ra ther in a suitable Internet-based repository.