Established in 1993, the Leonardo Electronic Almanac (ISSN No: 1071-4391) is the electronic arm of the world's most prestigious art journal, Leonardo - Journal of Art, Science & Technology. LEA is jointly produced by Leonardo, the International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology (ISAST) and published under the auspices of MIT Press.

LEA's birth and Leonardo's experiments with hypermedia publishing dates back further than 1993. In 1988, Ray Lauzzana (founder of fineArt forum) and Roger Malina, Leonardo's Executive Director decided to take fAf under the Leonardo publishing arm - marking the birth of Leonardo's experiments with world wide web publishing.

In December 1988, Judy Malloy took over Leonardo's role on fineArt forum, later with Nancy Nelson as co-ordinator. A database called F.A.S.T (Fine Art Science and Technology) on the Whole Earth bulletin board system was developed.

Malloy created the Words on Work (WOW) Project - to provide access to the electronic networks and make visible the work of artists, most of whom were not online at the time. Malloy's WOW still exists on the Leonardo On-Line website and print journal, and also spun off into a Leonardo project on Women , Art and Technology soon to be a book. Later, FAST was turned into a diskette and up for sale.

In 1989, the Art, Science Technology Network ASTN was inaugurated (at the time by Ray Lauzzana, Mark Resch and Roger Malina). It is now presided by Annick Bureaud, with Paul Brown, Ray Lauzzana, Denise Penrose, Roger Malina and Nisar Keshvani as members.

It was in 1992, that Leonardo decided to establish its own electronic publication forming the Leonardo Electronic Almanac. A year later, with Craig Harris at its helm, LEA became a credible source dedicated to providing a forum for those who are interested in the realm where art, science and technology converges.

Meanwhile Paul Brown, then a Professor of Art, at Mississippi State University brought fAf back with him to Australia. With grant funding, he set it up as a regular net news publication and took fAf into the world of the web as one of the first art sites. He edited the e-zine from 1992 - 1999, and in 2000 appointed Nisar Keshvani as editor. Brown took on fAf's executive editor role, and in 2001 Keshvani became editor-in-chief.

Now almost 10 years later, LEA and fAf have come full circle and formed a strategic alliance. In mid-2001, Nisar Keshvani took over as LEA's editor-in-chief. His role across both publications will strengthen the ties between the publications and more energy will be directed into developing a collaborative and symbiotic approach to editorial content across the two prestigious publications.

This alliance will pioneer the intersection of art, science and technology by maximising both fAf & LEA's resources, exploring the relationship between the art, sciences, and technology for the benefit of creative personnel on both sides of the "three cultures" with news, information, and critical content to assist and enable their work.

fAf-LEA's mission is to maintain and consolidate its position as the leading online news and trusted information filter whilst critically examining arts/science & technological works catering to the international CAST (Community of Artists, Scientist & Technologists)