Jeffrey, it is naive to think that publication cost is not a factor in the publication decision of authors from the developing world. The “traditional western journals” you referred to are quite prohibitive and while many southern researchers have published in them, many many others have been screened out by their prohibitive cost.

To me, these publishers who charge exorbitant rates (sometimes $8000 or more for a paper) are also qualified to be called predators. Or else they should let us know how much it cost them to process and publish the papers.

As for the journals on your list, i think you should be careful not to “throw the baby out with the bath water”. Some are definitely bad, but some others have well laid out editorial and assessment / review processes and are indeed well managed.

You must take your analysis further by researching the organizations further. In addition, if you really want to help your readers, do a similar compilation of non predatory “non-traditional western publishers” (i guess you must have evaluated some in the process of compiling your list of predatory ones) so that a comparative evaluation of their processes can be carried out vis – a – vis the predatory ones. You may also want to do a similar audit of the “traditional western” publishers to find out how rigorous they are in their publication process.

Well, don’t be fooled. The guy who picked the photo intentionaly pointed the view angle down, made the front looks depressing. Anyone who bothers to copy the address into Google street view, and look up, pun intended, would find that the building doesn’t look bad at all. This kind of trick is very dirty, and despicable. A decent scholar should have stopped using this list as a resource by now.

Thank you very much for this well-reasoned and helpful comment. Many of the OA publishers that charge article processing charges claim that they offer discounts or waivers for authors in developing countries, but I am not sure how often these discounts/wavers are really given, because I do get emails from many complaining about how the fees make publishing in OA journals impossible for them.

Of course, authors also have the option of publishing in traditional journals, those that do not charge a fee. They can make this work open access by depositing a postprint in a repository (this is called green OA).

Thanks again, and I hope you make more comments in the future.

I think it is fair enough to show the photo in that angle, at least it clearly shows the entrance, and we don’t know exactly how much space upstairs MDPI occupies. How do you think the first picture in this web page? http://www.mdpi.com/about/contact. MDPI intentionally presents a photo showing the whole street, although its office sits in a tiny dark corner. This kind of trick is very dirty, and despicable. A decent scholar should have stopped sending his/her manuscript to this publisher by now.

A few years ago Spencer & Braswell (2011. Remote Sensing, 3, no. 8: 1603-1613.) caused some controversy. The editor of the journal subsequently resigned, pointing out failures in the peer review process. For details see

http://retractionwatch.com/2011/09/02/editor-of-remote-sensing-resigns-over-controversial-climate-paper-co-author-stands-by-it/

The relevant paper remains online

I think that if MDPI really wants to address the problems highlighted by Mr. Beall they should start with publishing the anonymized peer reviews for past articles and implementing an open peer review system for future articles. I can assure them that it would be more effective than using online reputation management techniques.

Hi, Dr. Alwachi! Nice to hear from you. I enjoyed meeting you in Erbil.
1- European Journal of Health = [I cannot find a journal with this title listed in ISI]
2- Nephrology & Therapeutic = [Do you mean, "Journal of Nephrology and Therapeutics" ??] This journal does not have a valid impact factor.
I hope this is helpful.
Jeffrey

Mr. Beall, Fang not only spread rumors about you on his US-based blog, but also posted them on his sohu weibo–that’s something like twitter in China–on which he has over 19million followers(http://fangzhouzi.t.sohu.com/). What’s more, he wrote letters to OASPA, SPARC-Europe and even head of your library and chancellor of your university. So Mr. Beall, be prepared.

Thanks, and I understand. It is natural for people to want to protect their income.

Mr. anonym. Let him even write to the president of the US. Why should Jeffery be prepared while there is nothing wrong with what he did. He has revealed some facts about the MDPI operations an proved them and finally, warned authors and editors to stop publishing or serving on their boards. If MDPI thinks he is doing rights right and there is nothing to question about his operation why they keep posting several things that does not make any sense.
I think the person who needs to be prepared and ready is MDPI not Jeffrey.

Fang, the so-called Chinese science watchdog, is [considered by some to be] a liar and big plagiarist. The following is one of the many examples. Prof. Root-BernStein from Michigan State University, where Fang got his Ph.D. degree, formerly charged Fang with plagiarism and copyright infringement. There are more about these open letters from Prof. oot-BernStein here: http://www.2250s.com/list.php?28-page=2

RE: Did you get copyright or permission?

From:”rootbern@msu.edu”
To:”Shi-min Fang”

21 August 2011

Dear Dr. Fang,

What a joke! You threaten to no longer participate in this dialogue if I insist on making your emails to me, and mine in return, public? In the first place, what is the point of public letters, such as those that I have written, if they are not public? In the second place, since you have not participated in this discussion at all for quite some time, what difference does it make? Third, I thought your goal was to help China identify and reveal frauds wherever and whenever they occur, so why are you refusing to participate in an open discussion about what constitutes plagiarism and copyright infringement? And finally, and most importantly, how can you have the gall to demand that I keep private your emails to me when you have been attacking me and on your website and in the Chinese press behind my back this entire time? So, yes, this letter is going to everyone, and you can do as you like. You don?t play by anyone?s rules but your own anyway?

You ask where I got the figure that you have plagiarized as much as 90% of my article in yours and object that it could not possibly be more than 50%. Well, there?s a simple answer: I apparently have never been shown your entire article, even by you! You will recall sending me your translation of your article. It does not appear to be complete. So if I have been misled as to the amount my material that may be in your article, you are as much to blame as anyone.

In any event, at least we are talking about how much of my article appears in yours. On this point, one of your self-proclaimed supporters (email attached) actually puts the amount of your article that matches mine at 60%. No matter how we look at it, everyone ? including you ? agrees that a substantial portion of your article is drawn from mine. So the issue becomes how much is too much? You have already admitted that there was sufficient commonality that you should have cited me as the source of your arguments in your original blog. So if there is that much commonality, how can you deny both plagiarism and copyright infringement? The reason for making this a public debate is precisely because the issue of how much is too much needs to be hashed out and your own admissions certainly help make my case against you.

You also claim that I am making up my own definitions of plagiarism and copyright infringement. I insist on pointing out with regard to this question that the criteria I am using in accusing you of plagiarism and copyright infringement are not something I have made up. Every major journal and every educational institution has guidelines regarding these points, all of which are very similar. If Chinese scholars, such as yourself, expect to participate in the worldwide culture of science, you must learn to abide by the standards set forth in these guidelines. I have attached one such set from the American Chemical Society. You will note that not only do YOU not have the right to reproduce my article, even I do not have the right to use more than 400 words from my own publication, nor can I use my own illustrations, without written permission from the journal. Copyright not only protects the author of a work, but also the publisher of that work! This raises a point that has not yet been discussed in our correspondence, which is that you have not only plagiarized and/or breached the copyright on my article, but also Oxford University Press, which published the book in which my chapter appears. Did you get their written permission to use my material?

Your only response to that issue so far has been to say that you are an expert on fraud and you know that you have not plagiarized me or violated my copyright. Yet you refuse to reveal the criteria you are using in making that decision, which not only leaves me in the dark, but also leaves the people of China in the dark about how you reach your conclusions regarding the fraudulent behaviors of anyone you accuse. And there is an additional problem: even if you get around to divulging your criteria, you can’t be the judge in your own case. Indeed, you can’t be the accuser, judge and jury in any fraud case ? and yet that is exactly the power you have attempted to accrue to yourself.

And here we get to the crux of the matter. I am far less worried about whether you have stolen some of my work than I am worried that you have set yourself as an unassailable and unregulated monitor of fraud in China. No individual should ever have the power that you have taken upon yourself. You have every right, and indeed every responsibility, as do I!, to point out fraud wherever you think it occurs, but you do not have the right to decide whether your accusations are valid. For you see, if you have that right, then so do I, in which case you would be guilty of plagiarism and copyright violations just because I said so. You clearly don’t want that to be the case (nor do I), but you must learn from this controversy that you cannot have that power over others, either. The determination of fraud must lie in the hands of unbiased, disinterested parties, both in this case and in any other case you might bring or be accused of. I’m not sure who in China, or in the world, should decide how much of my work you should be permitted to use without permission, but I do know it is not you! My fondest hope at this point in time is that our controversy will lead to substantial changes in how fraudulent practices such as plagiarism and copyright infringement are handled in China and in who has the authority to handle such issues.

Quoting Shi-min Fang :

Dear Dr. Root-Bernstein,

I don’t know how you got the idea that “Dr. Fang’s article is essentially
90% (or somewhere around that percentage) my work”, and this unfair charge
has been posted on many Chinese Web sites as part of public smear campaign
against me. My article contains 11 paragraphs, and only 5 paragraphs are
about criteria of science from your article. Even if these 5 paragraphs were
directly translated from your article and contained nothing else (which is
not true), that would be only about 50% of my article.

I have been fighting against academic misconducts in China for eleven years,
and I am confident that I know how to determine a plagiarism case. I have
consulted two Chinese lawyers specified at intellectual property, and none
of them thinks my article infringe your copyright.

I don’t want to communicate with those persons who have harassed me, my
family, mentors, classmates and friends for years (I have to delete their
email addresses from the list again). As soon as you put them back to the
list, I knew this type of discussion would lead us nowhere. I will not
provide any further responses. If you insist keeping the discussion going,
can you please kindly remove my name from the list? Thank you.

Sincerely,

Shi-min Fang

what to do if your work is already published in this Fake journal PHOTON and you want to withdraw your paper?????????????????????

You can try to withdraw it, but this may be difficult. Send an email to Photon and tell the you want to withdraw the paper.
If you are successful in withdrawing the article, and you wish to re-submit it to another journal, I recommend that you be completely open and honest with the new journal’s editor — tell him or her the complete story.

Readers, the evidence that MDPI journals facilitate nonsense-based “science” goes beyond what Jeffrey Beall has already documented.

I’ve had an extraordinary two years seeking the much-needed retraction of the University of Sydney’s clownish yet “peer reviewed” finding – self-published by a lead author operating as “Guest Editor” in MDPI’s Nutrients “journal” – that there is “an inverse relationship” between sugar consumption and obesity: http://www.australianparadox.com/pdf/quickquizresearch.pdf

Following from HQ’s analysis (above) of time from submission to acceptance and from acceptance to publication in each journal:
MDPI state themselves on their journal websites the unusually fast manuscript handling; for example:
The journal ‘Viruses’ http://www.mdpi.com/journal/viruses:
“Rapid publication: manuscripts are peer-reviewed and published within 41 days (average Jan-Jun 2013)”
The journal ‘Molecules http://www.mdpi.com/journal/molecules:
“Rapid publication: manuscripts are peer-reviewed and published within 44 days (average Jan-Jun 2013)”

How can a journal go through a serious peer-review, author revisions, production and publication in 6 weeks?

Further, MDPI states that production includes professional copyediting and English editing – unless this is ‘extensive’: “A separate English editing charge will be applied to articles that require extensive English language editing or formatting.” – see http://www.mdpi.com/about/apc). How is ‘extensive’ measured? Since this copyediting come during production, then the author would find out about this hidden charge after their paper is accepted, no?

Thanks for saving me from swallowing the bait!
In my case, they clearly latched on the title of my recent grant project, which is, of course, public (including my e-mail address).

This is what I answered (just for inspiration):

Dear Dr. Harrison,

while I feel flattered by your invitation, I am afraid that I cannot imagine how my research could fit into the area of healthcare, or any of the remaining thematic areas covered by International Innovation (Climate, Energy, Environment, Food & Agriculture, ICT, Nano & Materials Technology, Regional Research or Transport). Moreover, I am rather doubtful if the readers of International Innovation will be interested in a basic research project without any obvious connection to practical application.
I am thus afraid that the time and effort invested into my possible contribution would be time and effort lost for more productive and enjoyable activities – such as research itself, or teaching. I would therefore be willing to contribute to your journal only (1) if it brings no cost for me or my institution and (2) if my investment of time and effort is compensated by an adequate honorarium.
As your mail does not mention any of these two points, I cannot give you a positive answer until I am sure that these two requirements are met.

With regards

Fatima Cvrckova

Now there is a more recent picture, allegedly taken by a guy who lives in Basel:
http://s2.t.itc.cn/mblog/pic/20142_23_16/m_a4tepx97117237840688.jpg

In this one, one could clearly see the MDPI sign at the front entrance. And the bakery seems to have been taken over by a Turkish bistro.

In China, Fang has not only been called a Science Watch-dog, but also a Crazy dog. He not only reportedly receives stipend from MDPI journals, but also allegedly receives money from other undisclosed sources. This alone proves that he is not simply a Science Watch-dog. He makes millions from a tricky business like publishing short messages written by himself or others on his website saying “someone plagiarized”.

MDPI is a very unprofessional lead and structured company that only focuses on a maximum profit with as low as possible investment into the paper. I’ve had several issues with them and could tell you even more about their way of dealing with them. I also once had the possibility to correspond with a employee based in China, that brought me a quite shocking insight on their working conditions. It was about time to have this publisher listed here.

Hi Jerry,
There is absolutely no point to write such a long response to Fang, he will simply twist your word and keep on abusing you on his blogs / websites / etc.

Fang is a much worse person than you could ever imagined. If you do wish to find out some truth, please search: Xiao ChuanGuo & Xiao procedure – a nerve rerouting surgery introduced by Xiao ChuanGuo, which has saved hundreds lives in the states & China, was accused by Fang in front of Chinese medias, that the procedure has 0 successful case.

Xiao sued Fang in WuHan China and won the case, Fang refused to execute the court’s ordere, and even started accusing the court in his blogs / web. Yes, this kind of things happens in China.

A lot of terrible things by Fang began to come out of water in past 2 years.

My opinion – Fang himself is one of the biggest fraud in China.

Cheers
Jx