Editorial: Writing – why bother?

Abstract

Arif Jinha at the University of Ottawa has estimated that the number of journal articles that have ever been published is around 50 million, with over a million now being published each year (Jinha 2010). Just why is there this seemingly insatiable compunction for people to publish their work? With so much being published, in so many fields, who reads it – and if no one reads it, does it matter?