(date stamping and provenance), certification (peer review), dissemination, and archiving—were introduced at inception by Philosophical Transactions. The beginnings of these ideas can be traced in a series of letters from Oldenburg to Robert Boyle: [24 November 1664] "We must be very careful as well of regist'ring the person and time of any new matter, as the matter itselfe, whereby the honor of the invention will be reliably preserved to all posterity" (registration and archiving) [3 December 1664] "...all ingenious men will thereby be incouraged to impact their knowledge and discoverys" (dissemination) The council minutes of 1 March 1665 made provisions for the tract to be revised by members of the council of the Royal Society, providing the framework for peer review to eventually develop, becoming fully systematic as a process by the 1830s. The printed journal replaced much of Oldenburg's letter-writing to correspondents, at least on scientific matters, and as such can be seen as a labour-saving device. Oldenburg also described his journal as "one of these philosophical commonplace books", indicating his intention to produce a collective notebook between scientists. Over the years the form of the contributions to the journal evolved as part of the changing expectations for persuasive scientific claims and the changing roles of scientists with respect to publication. Issue 1 contained such articles as: an account of the improvement of optic glasses; the first report on the Great Red Spot of Jupiter; a prediction on the motion of a recent comet (probably an Oort cloud object); a review of Robert Boyle's Experimental History of Cold; Robert Boyle's own report of a deformed calf; "A report of a peculiar lead-ore from Germany, and the use thereof"; "Of an Hungarian Bolus, of the Same Effect with the Bolus Armenus"; "Of the New American Whale-Fishing about the Bermudas", and "A Narrative Concerning the Success of Pendulum-Watches at Sea for the Longitudes". The final article of the issue concerned "The Character, Lately Published beyond the Seas, of an Eminent Person, not Long Since Dead at Tholouse, Where He Was a Councellor of Parliament". The eminent person in question was Pierre de Fermat, although the issue failed to mention his last theorem. In the first year of the journal, also the formula for determining the year of the Julian Period, given its character involving three four-digit numbers, was published by Jacques de Billy. Oldenburg referred to himself as the "compiler" and