In October 1996, I was appointed content editor of Reading Online, the first peer-reviewed journal launched by the International Reading Association in more than a dozen years. To add an extra challenge to the job of leading a new journal, ROL was to be a new type of publication -- a completely online resource, available only through the Internet and designed to make use of and explore the possibilities of the medium.

We've come a long way and made many changes over the past four years. To find out where we were and where we are, click on the shapes in the graphic organizer below. To find out where we're going, continue to visit Reading Online in the coming months, when incoming editors Bridget Dalton and Dana Grisham take the helm.

Martha Dillner is a professor of reading and instructional technology at the University of Houston-Clear Lake in Houston, Texas, USA. She earned her doctorate in reading and curriculum and instruction at the University of Florida and has spent over 25 years teaching in both public school and university settings. In addition to coauthoring five textbooks, Dr. Dillner has developed and published instructional software, including an application that uses interactive multimedia to help preservice and inservice teachers learn how to use the Language Experience Approach. She also has created a set of hypertext lessons for elementary-level reading instruction and an interactive computer kiosk that uses photographs, audio clips, and video clips to depict the history of the University of Houston-Clear Lake. Dr. Dillner has contributed numerous articles to international, national, and state journals, and has been awarded several grants for her continued research, including a US$100,000 grant from the United States Office of Education Right to Read Program. She has presented papers at international and regional conferences, has served as president of the International Reading Association's Microcomputers in Reading Special Interest Group, and has served as editor of the group's electronic newsletter, MicroMissive.