Dimitris Politis writes: Our journals are alive and well, and the new Annals of Applied Statistics has become an instant winner with authors and readers. As I mentioned in my letter to the IMS Bulletin (vol. 39, no. 2), the advent of manuscript-central has endowed journals with an unprecedented efficiency; the downside, however, is the temptation to impose unrealistically short reviewing deadlines that may result in superficial refereeing. Another point of debate has been whether to embrace (fully) electronic journals. We are now at a mid-point of sorts, in the sense that most of us routinely access journal papers in electronic form, and furthermore journals have started posting supplements only available electronically. Going electronic all the way seems to be inevitable, and—as a welcome side-effect—may help us to get rid of current Procrustean tactics to artificially elongate short papers, cut long ones, and generally try to ensure uniformity/conformity.

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