As I was cleaning out my bookshelves to give some books to my school’s library, I encountered stacks of reprints of law review articles.  In the olden days, sending reprints was a regular thing.  We would order extra reprints of our articles and then send them postally (!) to colleagues, often with a short personal note.

When I was going through my bookshelves, it was very sweet to see such reprints from friends and colleagues.

I confess that I mostly don’t miss the reprints.  I prefer to read things on a computer screen and I’m glad to avoid the ecological and financial costs of hard copies.

I really appreciate Texas Aggie Peter Reilly’s service of collecting and circulating people’s blurbs of what they’re up to.  It’s a convenient, efficient, and ecological way to share our work in our own voices.

Too bad there are no handwritten notes.  Oh well.