Now that I have moved into the role of "Senior Editor," I leave behind the daily management of the journal (now in the capable hands of Cheryl Ball and Beth Hewett) and turn my energies toward some new projects that I've been interested in developing for the journal. One of those projects involves developing research tools and access to metadata about the works we published from within the journal's interface, so I'll be working with the re-design team to provide some functionality that will hopefully make the journal both more usable and more useful and accessible (i.e. citable) as a scholarly resource. The other main project is the establishment of what I'm currently calling Kairos Projects. We'll provide infrastructure and support for the development of tools and archives that will be valuable to the computers and writing community, but we hope to do so in a way that will help make the argument that this kind of development work should qualify more as research/scholarship than as service when it comes time for tenure and promotion decisions. CompPile and E-Server.Org: Accessible Writing represent the kind of tools/resources I'm interested in supporting through Kairos Projects, although I'm also certainly interested in other innovative support systems as well.
Between the release of this issue and the next, you should see a call for proposals for Kairos Projects. Submissions will explain the usefulness and value of the tool or resource, as well as how that project plans to further the argument that such work is not simply service, but should be regarded as research or scholarship.
For more on the future of Kairos and forthcoming changes, see:
I imagine that the next ten years of Kairos will be every bit as fun and exciting as the first ten years--and I know that our editors and editorial board members will make certain that the journal is always providing the right time and the right place -- the opportune moment -- for high quality, innovative, important work. And I plan to stay part of this story for as long as it is kairotic for me to do so.
Douglas Eyman, Senior Editor