About Switched-On Gutenberg

boatruin

 

The idea of a cyberspace poetry journal came to Jana Harris in the early 1990’s when she was teaching an on-going advanced poetry writing workshop through the University of Washington’s extension program. At the time, it seemed to promise lower cost to poets in submitting to a journal, less waste of paper, and a shorter time between manuscript submission and publication. Switched-on Gutenberg was launched on the University’s web server in 1995.

The magazine has produced twenty-five issues in the last twenty-three years, under Jana’s stewardship, and with several different co-editors. Our readership has risen consistently to over 2,000 unique visitors per year/issue. In 2008, we relocated to a new commercial server, cutting our last tie with the University.

Our history reflects the great changes in technology and publishing in the last twenty years. The future of paper and print continues to be at risk, as economic conditions lead to closure of one long-established poetry journal after another, and many publishers have decided to reduce their risk by not publishing poetry at all. Some prestigious new literary e-magazines have seized the limelight, while some print journals are now publishing some or all of their content on-line. At the same time there are hundreds of on-line journals.

We recently decided to make some changes to Switched-on Gutenberg. Check out the Issue 25 Introduction for details.

We hope that you will continue to offer us your enthusiasm, support and poetry to the magazine.

Jana Harris, Roberta Feins and Linda Malnack, Editors