Our effort has been a close collaboration of scientist authors, foresighted publishers, computer networking experts, librarians and the AAS Executive Office staff. The AAS journals now enjoy a reputation for high quality of both the science and the presentation. This reputation must be maintained as we enter the electronic era. It was clear from the generally poor quality of self-published material available on the Internet that it would take work to produce a high quality electronic version of the AAS journals. The AAS Council was insistent that we maintain the quality of our material.
Price is also important.
On a per page basis, the AAS journals have a very low subscription cost, both to libraries and to members. The Society is mindful of the budgetary pressures on institutional libraries and always seeks to keep costs low. As we begin using the electronic networks we have to guard the intellectual property rights of the copyright holders. Good literature has considerable worth, both to the authors in the form of recognition of their work and to the publishers who have to cover the costs inherent in producing high quality, well written publications. As the AAS embarked upon the first experiments with submission and distribution of meeting abstracts, we quickly became aware that the same techniques, operating procedures and concerns apply to all the information and data which one distributes electronically.