+ in 
1ds 
act 
77). 
- 
2o 
ly 
and 
1d 
nd 
= 4131 > 
Coming to the future of periodicals, it is of course the most easiest to sur- 
render before exponential law, and to accept our fate that publications are 
ever growing but hardly be read anymore. Well, do we have any other chance? 
Let me at least try to discuss three alternatives. 
A first attempt can be just a few specialised international journals with 
the objective to publish those articles being worth to be communicated to 
the scientific world. "Photogrammetria" and "Bulletin Géodésique" are two 
such examples. 
About 50 years ago, in a period of intensive evolution of photogrammetry, O.v. 
GRUBER of Germany and W. SCHERMERHORN of the Netherlands felt the necessity to 
have a periodical being read in several countries. At that time, nothing suit- 
able did exist. Therefore, they founded "Photogrammetria" which still nowadays 
is the official international journal of ISPRS. This journal has a small print 
run as it is somewhat boring, for such an international periodical can not 
contain a sufficient amount of professional views to attract many non - 
Scientific readers in different countries and continents. However, conditions 
of these early days have changed since considerably. Meanwhile, there are some 
attractive national periodicals with international authors and with inter- 
national distribution. Adopting to this change of conditions one may consider 
there is no need to publish this international journal anymore. Hence, we would 
have compiled with the requirement to reduce the number of periodicals. Yet, 
when abandoning "Photogrammetria" two small problems would remain, however they 
will be solved by the following two alternatives. 
The situation in geodesy differs from photogrammetry insofar as there are 
less geodesists and, more important, as there are less national periodicals 
publishing highly sophisticated scientific papers, particularly in the English 
speaking world. Therefore it may be meaningful to continue with the international 
journal "Bulletin Géodésique". However, I feel myself not competent going 
into more details. This is a subject for my colleagues of IAG. 
A second attempt for reducing the number of periodicals in our field is to 
simplify adopt modes of communication being successfully applied already in 
other fields for quite some time. I refer to journals of chemistry. Here, fat 
papers are not published anymore in full length, but just as a synopsis, that 
is a somewhat enlarged abstract covering something like one page. In addition, 
anyone interested will be supplied with the full text on request. An even more 
modern mode can be to attach a microfiche to each issue of the journal, thus 
delivering immediately the full text for any article published as a synopsis. 
There are certainly advantages of the synopsis mode, and I will mention just 
a few: 
+ We quoted on page 3 that scientific articles are studied by nothing but two 
Scientists. Hence, it is not at all justified to publish those papers in 
full length in a periodical having a print run of several thousands. Ob- 
viously, there are more than two subscribers who will read or browse the paper, 
but they will be most happy with a synopsis. 
* Two or more periodicals can be merged into one without any loss of information 
to the professional world. 
Hothmer 8