2014Q3 Reports: CL Journal Editor

Highlights

Our raw submission numbers appear to keep the healthy trend of previous years, in the first five months of 2014 we have received 61 new submissions. As in previous years the number of thematically or qualitatively unsuitable submissions is high (32). As in previous years, a significant proportion of the inappropriate submissions are often very short (of typical conference paper length) and either outside CL's scope, or unaware of relevant literature.

Our average time to first decision for articles for 2014 is 23 days overall and 74 days if excluding submissions rejected right away. Papers are submitted from all over the world, with the main submitting countries begin China, India, Spain, the US, and the UK.

Administrative Matters

Tanja Samardzic, the editorial assistant, has resigned. A new editorial assistant, Sarah Owayda, is taking over. They are at the moment overlapping until Sarah will have seen the entirety of the assistant's duties. In the previous overlaps this handing over had taken around three months. We thank Tanja for her work and welcome Sarah in her new functions.

Graeme Hirst, who served as book editor for the last 28 years, has indicated he would like to step down. Pierre Isabelle, the squib editor who already takes care of book reviews concerning Graeme's Morgan and Claypool series, does not wish to take over the book review editor position as well. A search has then been opened and distributed through the editorial board at large. One name has been proposed, and I am hoping others will arrive by the deadline, which has been set at the 15th of June. I will have more to report soon.

In the next twelve months, I am planning to tackle the question of how to add supplementary materials and commentaries to the articles.

Some reviewers have expressed dissatisfaction with the current review form. I plan to investigate other options. The main priority of course will remain the user-friendliness for the assistant and the editor, who use the interface on a daily basis.

Summary Statistics

Totals (All submissions in 2014, including survey proposals)

Total: 62

Accept: 3

Accept with revisions: 3

Revise and resubmit: 2

Reject: 1

Reject (not suitable): 32

No review, withdrawn: 0

No decision: 21