I think it's quite a stretch to describe all this as a hard-copy version of Jan's blog...
On Tue, 2011-10-18 at 16:49 -0700, Jan Heine wrote: > On Oct 18, 4:11 pm, Jim Thill - Hiawatha Cyclery <[email protected]> > wrote: > > I somewhat doubt that BQ is peer-reviewed in the same way that science > > journal articles are peer-reviewed. > > When I was working in science, I reviewed a number of papers, and had > mine reviewed. The process is the same as the one we use at BQ. The > copy editor (not Jan!) gets a submission and decides whether it > warrants another look or not. If the paper makes assertions about > history or technical issues, it goes out to review. The reviewers are > outsiders who are not directly involved with BQ: Jim Papadopoulos, > Frank Berto, Andreas Oehler and a few others. They are very qualified > and certainly not loath to criticize what they read. If they raise > objections, we don't publish the article unless the objections are > addressed by the authors. Like scientific journals, we also publish > all corrections and rebuttals concerning articles in BQ. (Does any > blog do that?) > > I think the fact that we had to retract only a handful of statements > in the last 9.5 years shows that the process works. You may have > different preferences in bikes – we all do, even among the BQ crew – > but when you read in Bicycle Quarterly that Bike A has more wheel flop > than Bike B, you can be confident that this is true. Whether you > prefer bikes with a lot of wheel flop is a different matter, but the > basic facts have stood the test of time. > > We try to expand the horizon of the magazine without diluting from > what makes it special. After all, if you want a test of the latest > Trek, from a rider who just loves getting on a shiny new bike, you can > get that elsewhere. Technical articles in BQ must break new ground and > be well-documented (which is perhaps why we get few outside > submissions - it takes a huge amount of work to do that type of > research). Historical articles must be documented as well. (I have a > lovely article on Speedwell titanium bikes that needs more > documentation before we can publish it.) Ride stories must be both > well-written and on a topic that is "off the beaten path" in some way > or other. Basically, it has to meet high standards to be worthy of > inclusion in Bicycle Quarterly. > > Each issue of BQ takes about 3-4 months of full-time work to put > together. Fortunately, that work is spread among a number of people, > so I have some time to work on product design for Compass Bicycles and > even ride my bike. A blog, like our "Off the Beaten Path," is > relatively simple and takes a few hours for each post. > > Jan Heine > Editor > Bicycle Quarterly > http://www.bikequarterly.com > > Follow our blog at http://janheine.wordpress.com/ > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
