iVoyeur: Go, in Real Life
;login: Enters a New Phase of Its Evolution
For over 20 years, ;login: has been a print magazine with a digital version; in the two decades previous, it was USENIX’s newsletter, UNIX News. Since its inception 45 years ago, it has served as a medium through which the USENIX community learns about useful tools, research, and events from one another. Beginning in 2021, ;login: will no longer be the formally published print magazine as we’ve known it most recently, but rather reimagined as a digital publication with increased opportunities for interactivity among authors and readers.
Since USENIX became an open access publisher of papers in 2008, ;login: has remained our only content behind a membership paywall. In keeping with our commitment to open access, all ;login: content will be open to everyone when we make this change. However, only USENIX members at the sustainer level or higher, as well as student members, will have exclusive access to the interactivity options. Rik Farrow, the current editor of the magazine, will continue to provide leadership for the overall content offered in ;login:, which will be released via our website on a regular basis throughout the year.
As we plan to launch this new format, we are forming an editorial committee of volunteers from throughout the USENIX community to curate content, meaning that this will be a formally peer-reviewed publication. This new model will increase opportunities for the community to contribute to ;login: and engage with its content. In addition to written articles, we are open to other ideas of what you might want to experience.
Through a combination of unfortunate timing, unexpected workload, and laziness, I’m writing this column in the midst of a rare vacation, as I look out on the eastern front of the Rocky Mountains in late fall. I’m using a borrowed laptop (thanks Chris) in a land unencumbered by WiFi, and I’m hoping to find a GPRS signal strong enough to send it to Rik, my editor, before the deadline, which is today I think, or maybe tomorrow.
Although we’ve arrived only a few weeks later in the year than usual, everything is different here in my favorite place in the world: the air colder, the animals edgier, the light and foliage more dramatic. When we manage to make it up here, we expect to be snowed on at least once or twice, but this time we’ve been either rained, iced, or snowed on every day. This has only accentuated our hiking, affording us some privacy on the trails, increasing the contrast of our photos, and giving our supposedly waterproof boots an opportunity to prove their worth.