First, we have to face more directly than ever before the question of the grounds upon which publication can be refused, since we can't appeal to physical constraints as an alibi. This will involve nothing less than the working out of a new set of criteria for the handling of scholarly research. Indeed, it sometimes seems that journal articles exist solely to accumulate salary and tenure merit points, prior to their republication in expanded form. Hence in the hard sciences, or economics, where a common doxa exists, the journal article holds sway. Second, the question of what publication means is open.
Electronic publication offers the following scenario.
Librarians or libraries will cease to be warehouses of information and will become instead dealers in information, who locate, download, and print out articles on request. This is analogous to what seems to be happening in post-Fordist car production. As I understand it, car factories no longer produce cars en masse , so that dealers may then try to sell them. Of course, I am exaggerating what is merely a tendency in the calibration of production to demand. Electronic technology makes it possible to calculate with far greater accuracy and speed the number of times a given article is consulted.