The American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) has been publishing a refereed hardcopy variable star journal, the Journal of the AAVSO (JAAVSO), for over 30 years. This journal is published twice yearly, corresponding to the dates of our Spring and Fall meetings. It is sent free of charge to all of our Association members, as well as to outside paid subscribers. The Journal concentrates on variable star observations and analysis, but also publishes on a wide variety of other topics of interest to observers, such as historical articles, instrumentation features, and observing tutorials.

Starting about mid-2005, the JAAVSO has also been available in electronic form: the eJAAVSO. The articles posted at http://www.aavso.org/publications/jaavso/index.shtml are exact copies of the articles that have been or will be published in the Journal. The primary reason for the electronic version is to provide timely access to articles rather than waiting for the hardcopy publication. All eJAAVSO articles are posted as soon as the refereeing process is completed, and are immediately available on ADS.

We welcome all observers to contribute articles to the JAAVSO. The only restriction is that non-members do have to pay minimal page charges. Often it is cheaper to join the Association if you have more than one paper to publish. There are no restrictions as to datamining, visual vs. CCD, amateur vs. professional contributions, etc.; all are welcome as long as the science is interesting. However, contributions should be formal papers, well-written and with detailed analysis, and not just short notes. Instructions are available at the above URL.

For short contributions, such as a new classification, period or coordinates of an existing variable, the discovery of a single variable, etc., we are implementing a new service in early 2006. The Variable Star Index (VSX) is a database of most known variable stars, culled from the GCVS, NSV, NSVS, ASAS, OGLE and other surveys. It is easily searchable and gives many datamining tools such as cross-identifications and links to finding charts and light curves. One of the main attractions of VSX is its extensibility. An observer can update information and add new variables to the system, with the proviso that all such contributions will be placed in a queue to be vetted by a group of expert observers before being included in VSX. The system keeps a history of all modifications, so that changes to, say, a GCVS variable, will not overwrite the original catalog information, but will be shown as an update with the original information also available. The AAVSO will announce on the major variable star maillists when the VSX service is available.