SUBMISSION GUIDELINES AND NOTES FOR AUTHORS: JOURNAL OF COMPUTER MEDIATED COMMUNICATION

NOTE: Effective January 1, 2004, new proposals and submissions should be e-mailed to Prof. Susan Herring at jcmc @ indiana.edu.

Articles may be submitted to JCMC for publication at any time. Any CMC-related topic is acceptable. Although we organize some of our articles into special issues, we encourage your contributions and will happily find a place for articles of high quality regardless of topic. Similarly, if you would like to submit a proposal for a special issue, we invite you to do so.

Articles submitted to JCMC should make a contribution to knowledge in the field of computer-mediated communication. No one discipline, and no single methodology is viewed as inherently superior. Research based in any of the social sciences is welcome.

Acceptable articles will most frequently join theoretical analysis with empirical investigation, and/or incorporate demonstration or simulation. Reviews, synthesis, and meta-analyses of prior research are also welcome. The use of abstracts, introduction and conclusion sections is encouraged. In all cases, the implications for future work should be discussed. Rigorous argumentation and clear, comprehensible, compact and considerate presentation are expected. These dimensions will be used as criteria in the review process.

At the same time, authors are encouraged to take advantage of the expressive possibilities afforded by JCMC's multimodal, web-based format. Articles may contain any combination of text, tables, graphics, animation, or audio components. Innovative forms of expressing research, and/or linking members of the scientific community, are welcome. JCMC editors will make every possible effort to accommodate presentation formats.

Submission procedure: Articles submitted should be full-length scholarly papers (roughly 7,500-10,000 words).

The academic citation style used in JCMC follows the most recent American Psychological Association Manual of Style. In addition, authors are encouraged to link their references to online sources, where available.

Articles will be reviewed in a double-blind fashion, shielding authors' and reviewers' identities wherever possible. Authors should take pains to remove all pointers to their own identity or to that of their institution.

Acknowledgments of receipt will be sent by e-mail within a week of the date of submission. All articles will be reviewed by the editors and two referees. The advice of a third referree will be sought as warranted. The decision of the editors and the referrees' reviews will be returned by e-mail unless the author requests response by surface mail at the time of submission.

The submission of an article to JCMC implies that neither the article nor any of its parts is copyrighted or currently under review for any journal, edited collection, or conference proceedings . If the article, any portion of it, or any other version of it, has appeared, or is scheduled to appear in another publication of any kind, the details of such publication must be made known to the editors at the time of submission. Authors are encouraged to consult the JCMC copyright form to see precisely what sort of assurances they will be required to provide to the Editors.

Submissions to JCMC should be sent by e-mail. Submissions to the journal must be accompanied by a "covernote" e-mailed to the editors. The cover note should (1) describe in brief the submitted article, (2) indicate the format(s) used in its presentation, and (3) provide brief bios, e-mail and mailing addresses for the author(s). In addition, the covernote should include the statement: " The author(s) certify that neither the article nor any of its parts is copyrighted or currently under review for any journal, edited collection, or conference proceedings." At present, preferred formats for article submission are HTML, MS -Word or plain ASCII text. Binary components (graphics, sound files, etc.) may also be provided by hyperlink or sent as attachments to e-mail. Zipped archives containing all files are especially preferred.

The above copyright notice DOES NOT apply to the incorporation of pointers to publicly available network sources. JCMC encourages the inclusion of hypertextual links. For example, an article may contain links to items in art collections on the network, or to JCMC itself, or to bibliographies available on the net. Please keep in mind that many networked resources may be ephemeral. Authors should attempt to use "fresh" and long-lasting links.

Obviously, submitted articles will not be returned. Authors should retain an original copy.

Correspondence relating to articles already in the review cycle prior to January 1, 2004 should be e-mailed to Prof. Margaret McLaughlin at mmclaugh@usc.edu. Effective January 1, 2004, new submissions should be e-mailed to Prof. Susan Herring at jcmc@ indiana.edu.