IlliGAL Blogging

Welcome to the Illinois Genetic Algorithm Laboratory (IlliGAL) blog site. In April 1994, a graduate student named Kate Sherwood (Ducky) put up the first IlliGAL web page. To my discredit, I didn't understand why she was so fascinated by the web, but in my defense, I didn't get in her way. Since then, the IlliGAL web site has grown and users from countries around the world generate some 8.4 million hits in nearly 200,000 visits annually. The website has undergone kaizen or continual improvement since Ducky's early efforts, and this blog represents the latest in a series of new features to be added to the site over the years.

Starting today, past and present IlliGAL lab members and affiliates will team up to blog on genetic algorithms, evolutionary computation, and related subjects. In the last American election cycle, blogging grew as a force to rival the mainstream media. In less well followed topics, blogging is growing at astonishing rates, and we hope that IlliGAL Blogging will become a resource and focal point for intelligent discourse in the growing community of genetic and evolutionary computation (GEC).

So let the blogging begin. As with other blogs, reader commentary strongly shapes the agenda, so join us with your comments, or join us with your own GEC-related blog, but join us.