BY M. STUART LYNN
EIC YEARS JANUARY1969–MARCH1973
THE BATTLE OF THE
COVERS
The battle of the covers. That was the beginning.
I had just taken over as Editor-in-Chief of CACM in 1969. Don Madden was then
ACM’s Executive Director. With undoubtedly some justification, he was concerned that the
covers of CACM were too drab and were not attractive to an increasingly broad base of
membership. He wanted to brighten them up.
Gerry Salton was my predecessor as EIC but had
moved over to edit
Journal of the ACM
(JACM). He had suggested me
as his replacement (I had been
editor of CACM’s then “
Scientific Applications” department). I
felt it was my duty—following in
Gerry’s distinguished footsteps—
to protect the prerogatives of the
volunteer EIC as El Supremo and
that I, not Don, should be making the decisions about CACM
covers. After all, CACM was primarily a prestigious research
journal (with ACM news thrown
in), not some fly-by-night computer magazine.
Kelly Gottlieb chaired the
Editorial Board, at the time the
governing body for publications.
He and the Board tried to referee
this mother of all publications
battles. Both Don and I were
adamant in our positions.
Kelly and the Editorial Board
found the right solution. They
settled on the notion (later
endorsed by Council) that there
should be an oversight Publications Board composed of broader
representation—not just editors—who would bring both the
business and the editorial perspective into consideration. That
was the beginning of a process
that eventually transformed
ACM’s publications.
As a small palliative step, we
did change CACM’s covers a bit
during my editorship, attempting to bring some cohesion into
the look and feel. The covers
were attractively (but not garishly) designed, all in black and
blue colors (see the accompanying examples). They were certainly more pleasing, but surely
not as much as Don would have
wanted.
In spite of the introduction of
some materials of broader interest such as Forum (edited by Bob