Electronic publishing and Acupuncture in Medicine.

The internet has fundamentally altered scientific publishing; this article discusses current models and how they affect this journal. The greatest innovation is a new range of open access journals published only on the internet, aimed at rapid publication and universal access. In most cases authors pay a publication charge for the overhead costs of the journal. Journals that are published by professional organisations primarily for their members have some functions other than publishing research, including clinical articles, conference reports and news items. A small number of these journals are permitting open access to their research reports. Commercial science publishing still exists, where profit for shareholders provides motivation in addition to the desire to spread knowledge for the benefit of all. A range of electronic databases now exists that offer various levels of listing and searching. Some databases provide direct links to journal articles, such as the LinkOut scheme in PubMed. Acupuncture in Medicine will continue to publish in paper format; all research articles will be available on open access, but non-subscribers will need to pay for certain other articles for the first 12 months after publication. All Acupuncture in Medicine articles will in future be included in the LinkOut scheme, and be presented to the databases electronically.