Abstract
2012 saw changes for both botanical taxonomy in general and the journal Phytotaxa in particular. Effective from 1 January 2012, (1) electronic-only publication of new nomenclatural acts is allowed, if they are published online in Portable Document Format (PDF) with an International Standard Serial Number or an International Standard Book Number, and (2) the requirement for a Latin description or diagnosis for names of new taxa is dropped (a description or diagnosis for new taxa can be in either Latin or English (Knapp et al. 2011)). These changes represent exciting opportunities for botanical taxonomy. Phytotaxa embraced e-publishing with the first volume on 1 January 2012—Phytotaxa being in fact the first journal to publish new taxa and nomenclatural acts online following the new code amendment (as New Zealand happened to be the first country to enter the year 2012). Individual articles are published online now in PDF as soon as they are ready, and the print volume is produced for permanent archive somewhat later when enough papers are accumulated for one volume.