The part claiming that the publications are freely accessible is the problem. Subscription journals frequently charge submission fees (in my field of economics) and/or page charges to authors (in natural science fields).
Comment on Greedy Indian Publisher Charges Authors and Readers, Requires Copyright Transfer by David
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Comment on Mysterious Publisher Launches with 44 Journals by Dan
I, too, submitted a manuscript to them. I have agreed to let them publish it, but now am having second thoughts. I wonder if there would be any consequences if I were to withdraw the manuscript. Any opinions on this appreciated.
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Comment on Appeals by Adam
In other words, is it OK if I submit a paper in a journal indexed in Scopus but the publisher is listed as predatory publisher? Thank you.
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Comment on Appeals by Jeffrey Beall
No, not in my opinion. When I add a publisher to my list, I add it for good reasons, and I believe that scholars should not submit papers to journals belonging to publishers on y list.
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Comment on Researchers Find “Naming Of Allah” Prevents Certain Histological Changes in Slaughtered Broilers by SD
You overestimate the level of knowledge in the peer communities of some areas and underestimate the level of perceived cultural relevance for such types of research. In other words, the problem is far more systematic and institutionalized than many academics outside these systems realize.
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Comment on Is the Editor of the Springer Journal Scientometrics indifferent to plagiarism? by SD
No, no, no! The definition for plagiarism is not and must not be up for debate. There is confusion in the discussion here among three different things: plagiarism, writing style, and the degree of seriousness of the plagiarism (intentional, mistaken, criminal, etc). The style and seriousness may be debated and may be culturally influenced but the definition of plagiarism may not.
As a teacher who works in developing countries, helping scholars understand international standards for maintaining academic legitimacy and integrity, I am horrified! Not by plagiarism, but by a scientific organization’s editor behaving as if it doesn’t matter. It does matter and we are doing no favors to the scholars in the developing world if we deny that it matters simply because it is difficult for them to grasp while their educational systems and their language skills in English are still developing.
I will not address Mr. Beall’s tactics or motives which are irrelevant to the material facts: the editor ignores the plagiarism and claims to respect the ideas of these scholars (which are also plagiarized, btw). In my opinion, there is no respect happening here.
We are not truly giving these people respect for their ideas or the opportunity to advance and to join the worldwide academic community if we fail to teach them those skills that ultimately give them that access. I will not explain the nuances of plagiarism and style here as others have already done that to some degree, but I request all the scholars here who commented otherwise to please consider that it is to your advantage, to your country’s advantage, and to the world’s advantage that these skills be properly taught so that your ideas can be properly shared and incorporated into your field of study.
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Comment on Oxford on alert: predatory conference organisers are coming to town, or, Oxford beware: OMICS predators are coming to town by SD
I don’t know about this one in particular, but, in my experience, the “fake conferences” work pretty much like the fake journals. They take fees, then issue certificates (at times) or publish an abstract of a paper in conference proceedings (which have an ISBN, generally, to lend credibility) so that scholars can put this experience on CVs, etc. The legitimate conferences are similar, so it’s not such a stretch as it might seem. There are many conferences that accept hundreds of papers (as many as they have time for when allowing participants 10-15 minutes in perhaps 10 or more simultaneous sessions to present). It’s limited by venue space and time only, not academic quality or value. It’s a system for getting experience and meeting qualifications.
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Comment on Is the Editor of the Springer Journal Scientometrics indifferent to plagiarism? by Miguel Roig
Thank you very much for this most thoughtful contribution.
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Comment on Is the Editor of the Springer Journal Scientometrics indifferent to plagiarism? by Jeff Shrager
Yes, thank you for this most thoughtful contribution (uh, oh, I think I just plagairized Miguel! :-) Whereas I agree with you about not doing anyone favors by allowing them to cheat, I must respectfully disagree that the definition of plagairism “is not” debatable. First off, pretty much everything can be debated (although I guess it’s debatable whether that’s true for platonic concepts), but more specifically, the case here (at least the initial case where there were quotation marks clearly left out, but correct citations) not only can be debated, but we’re debating it before your eyes! So I think that on the face of it, the strong form of your assertion is proved false.
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Comment on New Open-Access Publisher Launches with 66 Journal Titles by Amy D.
I just received an unsolicited email from them asking me to review a manuscript (the manuscript was attached). I’m guessing they found me on ResearchGate, or possibly PubMed, as the email addressed me by my author name (literally: last name initials) on my one indexed paper and the paper subject is loosely related to the topic of my paper (and one of my ResearchGate areas of expertise). Not the best review process…I had to laugh at the “it will usually be okay if you can review some, but not all, aspects of a manuscript” piece!
Email:
Dear [redacted],
On the base of your expertise, we invite you to review this manuscript. It will usually be okay if you can review some, but not all, aspects of a manuscript.
If the study used a technique that you have never used, you can simply review the parts of the manuscript that are in your area of expertise, and tell us which parts you cannot review.
If you know you will not be able to review the manuscript by the deadline(within 21 days), then you should not accept the invitation. Sending in a review after the deadline will slow down the publication process.
Once the review is completed, you should submit the review report attached in this email to us.
At the end of your peer review, we ask you to indicate your final decision on the manuscript, by selecting one of the following recommendations:
• Accept as it is
• Requires Minor Revision
• Requires Major Revision
• Reject
Please let me know whether you are able to carry out the review by Accepting or Declining this invitation. In case, you are unable to review this manuscript at this point of time, please suggest suitable reviewers if you know any.
Look forward to hearing from you soon.
Best Regards
Kevin Nelson
Editorial Assistant
review.hrpub@gmail.com
Horizon Research Publishing, USA
http://www.hrpub.org
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Comment on New Open-Access Publisher Launches with 66 Journal Titles by Jeffrey Beall
Thanks for sharing this. I suspect that ‘Kevin Nelson’ is a made-up name.
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Comment on New Open-Access Publisher Launches with 66 Journal Titles by Amy D.
Also noting that the manuscript wasn’t blinded very well. The acknowledgements listed specific professors and the organization’s acronym was scattered throughout – it wouldn’t have taken much to figure out where this came from.
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Comment on Greedy Indian Publisher Charges Authors and Readers, Requires Copyright Transfer by Jeff Shrager
Okay, this is a bit of an overstatement … perhaps I’d even go so far as to agree that it’s a lie, not not even a little white lie. But all the publisher would have to do to make it true is to change the word “all” to something weaselly like “most major”. My point isn’t that they should do that, or that they should be forgiven for the lie, but that, lie aside, the exact same fact of the matter is the case for all the non-OA publishers, which is most of the major publishers, and these guys’ per volume price seem to me in line with what other major publishers charge. (Actually, these guys are significantly cheaper in some cases!) So, yeah, they should change that sentence, but to my mind that’s rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. (I’m not sure that’s the metaphor I mean, but you get the idea.)
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Comment on Is the Editor of the Springer Journal Scientometrics indifferent to plagiarism? by SD
Well, Jeff, you are correct, in THAT sense, yes, anything can be debated. :)
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Comment on Misleading Metrics: A New List on This Blog by RMS
Jeffrey, I appreciate this new list. It’s pretty easy to detect ‘fake’ metrics, but maybe you can clarify on your site, or here is the comments, what methodology you use to categorize a metric as “misleading”.
What I am trying to get at is: can a company other than Thomson Reuters and the like come up with a new “impact factor”? Or is this technically impossible due to lack of access to citation data?
I do see some value in an ‘extended’ impact factor that accounts for the many journals not covered by ISI, which are in large part new Open Access journals (not all of them predatory). Sure, such an impact factor would be easier to game since it would include “predatory” journals, but for the real journals that do not have an ISI IF this could be useful and insightful. Does such an impact factor already exist, or do all new IF companies simply make up the values out of thin air (as I am supposing most of the companies in your list are doing)?
Thanks.
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Comment on Misleading Metrics: A New List on This Blog by Jeffrey Beall
Hey, Rafael, Thanks for your comment. I do think that most of the companies on this list make up the value out of thin air, as you say.
Here is one new metric that is looking pretty good: <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12109-013-9339-y/fulltext.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">pre-SCORE</a>. So, if you are hinting that I am going to put all companies other than TR on my list, this shows otherwise! There are also tons of new altmetric companies that are not on the list. What separates those on the list from those not on it is honesty, chiefly.
I do list the criteria on the actual page where the companies are listed. That's my methodology.
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Comment on Misleading Metrics by Preet Khandelwal
Thank you very much Jeffrey Beall sir for opening this blog.
Dear Sir
Directory of Journal Quality Factor is probably bogus agency for evaluation of Journals, its prime aim is to earn money.
Some major concerns are given below:
They write on their website that evaluation on journals is performed by factors like Journal Quality, Author’s Contribution, Publisher quality, Technical Quality, Manuscript Quality, and standard quality but I can’t find any well defined formula or criterion for assessment of journal on their website (only name of criteria is given, not detailed are given).
They proposed some credit based system in which just 4 point is given to author’s contribution out of 22.
They do not give credit to significant scholarly results and finding published by journals.
No editorial member lists are available on website having educational backgrounds relevant to their areas of responsibility.
It seems that they do not know basic publishing standards and COPE.
Owner admits that they are not registered.
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Comment on Greedy Indian Publisher Charges Authors and Readers, Requires Copyright Transfer by Douglas LaFrenier
No opinion on this publisher, but one might mourn the days when the costs of publication were shared by reader and author. Society page charges began to disappear when Pergamon and other commercial publishers dived into the scholarly realm, stealing authors away. Societies began to abandon page charges to compete, with the result that subscription prices soared, as only the subscribers were left to bear the costs. Note that the American Astronomical Society continues to impose page charges on authors, and has reasonable subscription prices.
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Comment on Misleading Metrics: A New List on This Blog by Liam Mac Liam
Hope you are not being too harsh on the Directory of Journal Quality Factor, Jeffrey – after all they are partnered with such august bodies as the International NonOlympic University and the the International Nobel Peace Prize Recommendation Forum who point out on their website that “The board of directors tires to divulge the capabilities of intelligentsias and finally recommends the elite researchers and profession” . Nothing to worry about there then as they are obviously pretty exhaustive in their approach.
No doubt as we read they are busy signing protocols with the DisUnited Nations, The NonEuropean Union and the World UnHealth Organization.
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Comment on Greedy Indian Publisher Charges Authors and Readers, Requires Copyright Transfer by dnarnold
For a detailed example of a gross case of plagiarism published in a Research India Publications journal and the nonresponsiveness of the publisher in dealing with it when brought to his attention is
http://siam.org/journals/plagiary/index.php
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