A Continuous Publication System.

With Folding & Design, we are introducing a ‘Continuous Publication System’ (CPS) that we believe is a large step in the direction that many journals will take in the next few years. The key part of this system is the publication of each Research Paper on the internet as soon as possible after it has been accepted. This takes a little time, as each paper still has to be edited, proofed and converted into electronic format, but it still ensures that the papers are published before the issue of the journal that contains them is printed.Note the word ‘published’. We take the view that in a CPS, the publication date of a paper will be considered as the date on which it becomes available through the internet, rather than the date on the cover of the issue in which it is subsequently printed. Therefore, every paper has its own date of publication, which is given both on the paper and in the table of contents, and in the first printed issue of a year—for example, this issue—there will inevitably be some papers that have been published in the previous year. In addition, each paper has been given an ‘electronic identifier’. This comprises the ISSN number of the journal followed by the journal's volume number and the first page number of the article. In the near future, it will be simplest to access any paper via its electronic identifier.Clearly, the major point of our CPS is to make the information published in Folding & Design available to the scientific community as rapidly as possible. For the time being, at least, this will apply only to the Research Papers in the journal because they contain the most time-sensitive information. However, each complete issue of the journal will become available via the internet at about the same time as it is posted to subscribers.All subscribers will have free access to Folding & Design on the World Wide Web. To obtain access you will need to become a member of BioMedNet, which is free to subscribers and brings many benefits. The World Wide Web address of BioMedNet is BioMedNet. Non-subscribers can buy access to the complete journal or to individual articles.We are delighted to have two editors for Folding & Design who are as enthusiastic as we are about the new opportunities for publishing scientific information opened up by the internet, and we welcome comments on the journal's CPS, which is but the first step in a new direction.