[Journal] OSGEO journal
Christian Willmes
c.willmes at uni-koeln.de
Fri Nov 27 08:44:45 PST 2015
Dear Dimitris,
Am 27.11.2015 um 17:19 schrieb Dimitris Kotzinos:
> Hi Christian,
>
> no offense taken and last point from my part because I start feeling
> that I bother everybody.
> I am sorry but I do not agree that expressing a personal opinion in a
> discussion on how to proceed is perceived as blocking something. I think
> that I would like to preserve my capacity and my right to express my
> opinions in a polite and non offensive way.
You are absolutely right, no discussion about this.
> We do not need all to agree,
> the community has processes on how it reaches decisions that are
> respected by all (at least by me).
I am not sure if I understand this. To what process are you referring?
Was this process disregarded, and if so, how?
> For you question:
> About the journal team/committee you can see here:
> https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Journal
> About the education committee you can see here:
> https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Education_and_Curriculum_Committee
> and the discussion going on is summarized here:
> https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/GeoForAll_OSGeo_Relationship
By just looking briefly at this links I still don't get it. Anyway the
OSGeo Education committee is formally independent of the OSGeo Journal,
although there should be clearly a lot of overlap. We should not get
into the Geo4All discussion here and now I think.
We should find a way of rebooting the Journal.
Best regards,
Christian
>
> A nice weekend to all,
> Dimitris
>
>
>
> On 27/11/15 5:00 μ.μ., Christian Willmes wrote:
>> Dear Dimitris,
>>
>> thank you for your opinions, answers inline.
>>
>> Am 27.11.2015 um 16:15 schrieb Dimitris Kotzinos:
>>> Hi Christian,
>>>
>>> it is fine to be blunt
>> great, no personal offence just talking straight. :)
>>> but you complete missed the point because I did
>>> not impose anything on anyone
>> By advocating we should have an OSGeo Journal without academic content,
>> you impose at least on me not to be able to realize my goal of having
>> academic content in the Journal, like it has been for the last years.
>>
>>> - at least I do not think so and I am
>>> sorry you felt like this. And I am really curious how exactly did I
>>> impose something on you or anyone else?
>> see argument above.
>>
>>> And please: I do not have a section in the Journal that is "mine" to
>>> decide on what content I want to see in it or anywhere else. I am also
>>> not interested in an OSGEO journal where people have their own agendas.
>> That is the difference, I am in favour of having a heterogeneous Journal
>> with many 'own agendas'. For example yours and also mine.
>>
>>> I think that OSGEO Journal is a community effort and should represent
>>> what the community wants and should not be split into personal sections
>>> where people serve their own agendas!
>> Having multiple sections and agendas would actually facilitate to better
>> represent a heterogeneous community (that has even more agendas).
>>
>>> Other than that, as I said my personal feeling is that I do not see
>>> enough justification for yet another academic journal in the area and I
>>> also think that academia is a part of OSGEO not the whole; I even
>>> suggested compromises for all that, which have the potential of creating
>>> something reputable that will survive at the end of the day.
>>> And I think we should discuss all opinions until we reach a consensus.
>> I described why I think an academic part is justified. We need a
>> platform to academically introduce OSGeo projects and a platform for
>> project developers who want to describe their implementations on the
>> basis of OSGeo software to the academic community. Why don't you let
>> me/us just do it?
>> If disallowing academic content in the OSGeo Journal is an option you
>> bring to the table, I clearly oppose that. On the other side, including
>> further ideas and more content realms and options is absolutely welcome
>> to me.
>>
>>> Best regards,
>>> Dimitris
>>>
>>> P.S.: You might have missed recent discussions but GeoForAll is actually
>>> the education committee of OSGEO and the Journal is under the
>>> newsletter/journal committee which is composed of the people in this
>>> mailing list. Thanks.
>>>
>> This one I certainly missed, can you point me to that decision,
>> assertion, or how this was established? I don't get why they changed the
>> name of the Edu Committee? Was there an official proposal or anything?
>>
>> Best regards,
>> Christian
>>
>>> On 27/11/15 2:51 μ.μ., Christian Willmes wrote:
>>>> Dear Dimitris,
>>>>
>>>> It is perfectly fine, if you do not want to participate in editing
>>>> academic content, because you think its not needed. But imposing on
>>>> others to not do this if they want, is not. I already said, why I think
>>>> an academic Journal would be good for OSGeo, your reasons for not having
>>>> an academic Journal do not address the points I made.
>>>>
>>>> You can work on your agenda by acquiring content you want to see in the
>>>> Journal (in your section). Others can work on their agendas to see the
>>>> content they want to have in the Journal. We should now define a process
>>>> that enables all this in an open inclusive way. In the end how this
>>>> process will take gestalt is what defines what the Journal actually is
>>>> and will be about.
>>>>
>>>> My proposal was just to facilitate and enable this heterogeneous
>>>> approach for the Journal to first just get it reactivated and actually
>>>> do things.
>>>>
>>>> And for me it is 100% clear, that the OSGeo Journal is under the
>>>> umbrella of OSGeo and maybe its Education committee. Geo4All is of
>>>> course invited to participate.
>>>>
>>>> (Sorry for maybe being blunt.) Thanks,
>>>> Christian
>>>>
>>>> Am 27.11.2015 um 11:32 schrieb Dimitris Kotzinos:
>>>>> Dear Christian, all,
>>>>>
>>>>> thanks for the interesting discussion and my apologies for the slow
>>>>> response.
>>>>> I would like to start by saying that I am also in Academia, so
>>>>> suggesting an academic journal would also be a natural thing for me.
>>>>> And
>>>>> this was also a discussion some years ago when I originally created the
>>>>> proposal I referred to last time.
>>>>> So let me put my thoughts forward:
>>>>>
>>>>> 1/ do we need another academic journal in GI and should OSGEO be the
>>>>> venue hosting it?
>>>>> My answer is no, there are already enough that we can use to publish in
>>>>> various formats (open access or not). Moreover why would someone
>>>>> publish
>>>>> in a Journal? Because the publisher and the editorial team would
>>>>> provide
>>>>> some guarantees of quality. But keep in mind that OSGEO is not an
>>>>> academic only organization in principle. So why would someone choose it
>>>>> over other publishing venues?
>>>>> So my answer in both questions above is no.
>>>>> 2/ is there an academic issue not covered elsewhere?
>>>>> Open Source GI per se is not in my view an academic issue, various
>>>>> results obtain by OS software yes but not the software used in most
>>>>> cases!
>>>>> 3/ what is the difference from having only special issues?
>>>>> The main difference is that it is organized by and through the
>>>>> review of
>>>>> a conference and the criteria are defined by the conference. So the
>>>>> journal is only providing a publishing venue in case people cannot find
>>>>> anything more "academic" like a special issue in an established
>>>>> journal.
>>>>> 4/ do we need an OSGEO journal?
>>>>> yes but in my view not in an academic sense. We need a dissemination
>>>>> venue for various activities to be documented. Including academic
>>>>> related activities but not only. We need an OSGEO community journal.
>>>>> Maybe a journal where someone could find articles from industr,
>>>>> academia
>>>>> or just users on the same subject. This is what I feel is missing and
>>>>> not another academic journal.
>>>>>
>>>>> Maybe I can also suggest a compromise:
>>>>> OSGEO Journal for reporting OSGEO community actions (including academic
>>>>> issues) and one independent academic journal that I will propose and
>>>>> probably I can run with Christian and whoever else is interested under
>>>>> the GeoForAll umbrella if we feel that something like this is missing
>>>>> (which would have some meaning in order to help establishing the
>>>>> GeoForAll community processes).
>>>>> As I said I would be happy to help with whatever solution we agree on,
>>>>> but we need to agree first on the character of the journal for the next
>>>>> few years.
>>>>>
>>>>> My 2c and sorry for the verbosity,
>>>>> Dimitris
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On 27/11/15 11:06 π.μ., Christian Willmes wrote:
>>>>>> Thank you Helena and Landon for your encouragement.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I don't want to take over the Journal and replace existing volunteers,
>>>>>> but I would step up as a co-editor and take a defined set of
>>>>>> responsibilities.
>>>>>> I am working in academia, so I would like to work on the academic side
>>>>>> of the Journal. Additionally I would also help on the infrastructure
>>>>>> side.
>>>>>> I could think of a team of co-editors, each co-editor responsible
>>>>>> for a
>>>>>> defined set of responsibilities and according section of the Journal.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I think Landon and Dimitris have kind of similar interest in the
>>>>>> newsletter and annual report like contents of the journal, so you
>>>>>> could
>>>>>> team up to edit this part of the journal?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Barend has carried the academic track issues in the past and did a
>>>>>> great
>>>>>> job on this. I would appreciate if he would continue this excellent
>>>>>> contribution?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Eli does a lot of the work that is not so much valued by people who
>>>>>> don't look behind the scenes, like copy editing or taking care of the
>>>>>> web infrastructure and general issues. He should be recognized for
>>>>>> this
>>>>>> commitment and also be named co-editor.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I would see the editor team right now like this:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> - Landon and Dimitris: Newsletter style content and annual reports
>>>>>> - Barend (and maybe Franz-Josef): FOSS4G Academic Track
>>>>>> - Eli: Production Editor and web infrastructure
>>>>>> - Me (and maybe Helena and/or Venka and/or Charlie): Regular Academic
>>>>>> Content
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I think if we would define the responsibilities and then share them
>>>>>> on a
>>>>>> team of many co-editors would be a good approach to lessen the
>>>>>> workload
>>>>>> on each co-editor and reactivate the OSGeo Journal.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Best regards,
>>>>>> Christian
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Am 23.11.2015 um 20:03 schrieb Helena Mitasova:
>>>>>>> Christian
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> - I am very much in support of your ideas. It may be useful to post
>>>>>>> this vision on the geo4all and osgeo discuss list. I am sure there
>>>>>>> will be volunteers willing to help out or at least encourage
>>>>>>> contributions and reviews. This would also help to coordinate with
>>>>>>> other publishing ideas such as the one proposed by Charlie
>>>>>>> focusing on
>>>>>>> peer reviewed educational material (which would be interesting niche
>>>>>>> that nobody has done so far - we could have one of the issues focused
>>>>>>> on that topic).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Helena
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Mon, Nov 23, 2015 at 1:29 PM, Christian Willmes
>>>>>>> <c.willmes at uni-koeln.de <mailto:c.willmes at uni-koeln.de>> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Dear Dimitris,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> its great to hear, that you are also interested in working
>>>>>>> on the
>>>>>>> OSGeo Journal.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Regarding your proposal and ideas, I see the OSGeo Journal
>>>>>>> more as
>>>>>>> an academic journal, just look at the history of published
>>>>>>> issues
>>>>>>> [1]. Five academic tracks proceedings, I did not counted the
>>>>>>> single academic papers, but it will amount to 30-40 papers I
>>>>>>> think.
>>>>>>> I am in favour to also have community reports, if they are
>>>>>>> provided (what was not abundantly the case in the past either).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> But here is my analysis of and vision for the Journal.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> First, the Journal has failed to build enough academic
>>>>>>> merit, that
>>>>>>> researchers seriously consider to submit their work to the
>>>>>>> Journal.
>>>>>>> Second, the articles about community activities need to be
>>>>>>> published and circulated within short time spans after that
>>>>>>> activity/event, thus a longer editing and publication
>>>>>>> process as
>>>>>>> inevitable for a peer-reviewed Journal is not suitable. Thus,
>>>>>>> these posts are ending up on blogs and also on the wiki. And I
>>>>>>> actually think, that this is the better forum for this kind of
>>>>>>> content, including lots of photos, web links and also videos,
>>>>>>> etc..
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> So, I would suggest to keep the journal more in an academic
>>>>>>> direction, and try to build merit, so that researchers start to
>>>>>>> reconsider submitting to the OSGeo journal. One big point in
>>>>>>> this
>>>>>>> is, that the Journal should be the default publication for
>>>>>>> FOSS4G
>>>>>>> academic track contributions. Of course, attracting
>>>>>>> academics with
>>>>>>> the possibility of publications in a higher ranking journal
>>>>>>> like
>>>>>>> Transactions in GIS in the past, for some few best submissions
>>>>>>> each year should be also the case in the future as a major
>>>>>>> attractor for academics. This practice would also yield more
>>>>>>> submissions to be published in the OSGeo Journal.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I think the OSGeo Journal can and should take a niche, that
>>>>>>> is not
>>>>>>> really occupied in the Journal landscape yet. That is, articles
>>>>>>> presenting OSGeo Projects, including software architecture,
>>>>>>> licensing model, road maps, overview of dev community, etc.
>>>>>>> and of
>>>>>>> course case studies that focus on the application of OSGeo
>>>>>>> projects in education, in public sector, for development
>>>>>>> work, in
>>>>>>> industry etc.. These papers do not have to meet the highest
>>>>>>> academic standards, they primarily have the function to
>>>>>>> highlight
>>>>>>> OSGeo projects and to provide citable works on these OSGeo
>>>>>>> Projects. The submission of papers should be generally open to
>>>>>>> everyone, no prerequisites (like acad. degrees or something)
>>>>>>> whatsoever.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Of course, a section on reposts from events etc. can and should
>>>>>>> also be maintained. I would suggest that we have at first one
>>>>>>> Issue per year (additionally to the FOSS4G academic track)
>>>>>>> that is
>>>>>>> open from the beginning of a year to the end, and adds
>>>>>>> submissions, as soon as they are reviewed and edited to this
>>>>>>> issue. Its no problem if there are at first very few papers
>>>>>>> in an
>>>>>>> issue, it is more important, that we start to publish again. We
>>>>>>> should keep it as simple as possible, not overarching criteria,
>>>>>>> such as themes etc.. The only important criteria should be,
>>>>>>> that
>>>>>>> it has something to do with OSGeo. Quality and validity is
>>>>>>> checked
>>>>>>> and if needed improved during the review process.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> So, I would like to volunteer for a Journal in that direction.
>>>>>>> I am open to other directions, but prefer the above depicted
>>>>>>> agenda.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Regards,
>>>>>>> Christian
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> [1] https://journal.osgeo.org/index.php/journal
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Am 21.11.2015 um 10:08 schrieb Dimitris Kotzinos:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Dear all,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I was involved in the past in the OSGEO Journal and even
>>>>>>> worked as
>>>>>>> section editor at times.
>>>>>>> One problem that the journal has and will keep having is
>>>>>>> that
>>>>>>> it is
>>>>>>> based strictly in volunteer time which is in many cases
>>>>>>> unpredictable
>>>>>>> and usually not constant. The only solution I have seen
>>>>>>> in any
>>>>>>> open
>>>>>>> source project around this, is to build a team of
>>>>>>> volunteers
>>>>>>> so that the
>>>>>>> work is shared and to be flexible around the deadlines.
>>>>>>> So if we are some I would also offer to be involved into
>>>>>>> the
>>>>>>> process. I
>>>>>>> think that for me it would be better to be involved in
>>>>>>> organizing the
>>>>>>> process, making the calls and do less on the technical work
>>>>>>> (which I see
>>>>>>> that Christian and Eli might like more). But of course 3
>>>>>>> people are not
>>>>>>> enough to make sure that we can sustain the Journal
>>>>>>> publication in a
>>>>>>> timely manner.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Given that I am also reiterating a proposal submitted
>>>>>>> back in
>>>>>>> 2012 [1]
>>>>>>> but did not receive much attention or reaction at that
>>>>>>> moment.
>>>>>>> There I
>>>>>>> share some ideas of how to share responsibilities and
>>>>>>> how to
>>>>>>> structure
>>>>>>> the journal. If you want we can use this as a starting
>>>>>>> point
>>>>>>> for the
>>>>>>> discussion and feel free to edit along!
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Note also that this would be kept as a foundation
>>>>>>> Journal and
>>>>>>> not a
>>>>>>> scientific journal where we focus on activities within the
>>>>>>> foundation,
>>>>>>> the local/regional chapters and the various kinds of events
>>>>>>> and their
>>>>>>> results. We can further discuss if we would like to
>>>>>>> create an
>>>>>>> additional
>>>>>>> Academic/Scientific Journal with the colleagues who are
>>>>>>> involved in the
>>>>>>> Geo4All activity.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Finally, thanks to Landon for pushing the carriage for many
>>>>>>> years; the
>>>>>>> editor's job is quite lonely and sometimes also
>>>>>>> frustrating! :)
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> My 2c,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Dimitris
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> [1]
>>>>>>> https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/A_proposal_for_the_OSGeo_Journal
>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>> newsletter mailing list
>>>>>>> newsletter at lists.osgeo.org
>>>>>>> <mailto:newsletter at lists.osgeo.org>
>>>>>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/newsletter
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> -- Christian Willmes
>>>>>>> AG GIS & Fernerkundung | GIS & RS Group
>>>>>>> Geographisches Institut | Institute of Geography
>>>>>>> Universität zu Köln | University of Cologne
>>>>>>> Tel.: +49 (0)221 470 6234 <tel:%2B49%20%280%29221%20470%206234>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> http://www.geographie.uni-koeln.de/willmes-christian.695.en.html
>>>>>>> http://www.sfb806.de
>>>>>>> http://crc806db.uni-koeln.de
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>> newsletter mailing list
>>>>>>> newsletter at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:newsletter at lists.osgeo.org>
>>>>>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/newsletter
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>> Helena Mitasova
>>>>>>> Professor
>>>>>>> Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences
>>>>>>> North Carolina State University
>>>>>>> 1125 Jordan Hall
>>>>>>> NCSU Box 8208
>>>>>>> Raleigh, NC 27695-8208
>>>>>>> http://www4.ncsu.edu/~hmitaso/ <http://www4.ncsu.edu/%7Ehmitaso/>
>>>>>>> http://geospatial.ncsu.edu/
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> email: hmitaso at ncsu.edu <mailto:hmitaso at ncsu.edu>
>>>>>>> ph: 919-513-1327 (no voicemail)
>>>>>>> fax 919 515-7802
--
Christian Willmes
AG GIS & Fernerkundung | GIS & RS Group
Geographisches Institut | Institute of Geography
Universität zu Köln | University of Cologne
Tel.: +49 (0)221 470 6234
http://www.geographie.uni-koeln.de/willmes-christian.695.en.html
http://www.sfb806.de
http://crc806db.uni-koeln.de
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