The below comments were earlier posted by Prof. Emanuel S. Grant in Dec 2013. We are resending the same on behalf of Prof Grant and with his full knowledge, consent and permission as it was not posted previously.
——————————–
Mr Jeffrey Beall
UCD
Via Email
“I am an associate of GSTF, but am commenting in my capacity as an academic who has reviewed many journal and conference submissions. Academic conferences maybe viewed as external forums for critical review of ongoing/developing or nearing completion of research efforts. Internal review forums would be the group of involved researchers and immediate colleagues. Journals maybe seen as the repositories of perfected/completed works; they serve to chronicle works that have been attested to be complete authoritative statements of the topics covered. Journals should never be a forum for work that has not been critiqued, towards achieving that state of being complete and authoritative. If one accepts that proposition then the question is just how much content should be acceptable as original (unpublished in any other forum). Further, the phrase “original content” does not imply that the rest of the content is simply source from other researchers’/authors’ works; the entire content (with exception of related and background material) has to be that of the submitting authors. The “…at least twenty percent” required by GSTF seems to be a reasonable baseline, as it ensures that there is enough unpublished content to protect publishers’ ownership rights, and be complete and authoritative on the subject.
The rest of your blog content on GSTF seems to be highly misleading and petty personal assaults on the GSTF organization and personnel. The site block of GSTF by your institution’s Internet security tool has nothing to do with the activities of GSTF. While your lack of technical knowledge on the matter is excusable, your inability to make reasonable or logical conclusion cannot be excused. Another failure of drawing logical conclusion is your assertion that you were “pressured” “…to remove the publisher [GSTF] from my list”. If “…GSTF was successful in a legal action against” you then you were not pressured; you were WRONG!
Your insinuation of some kind of nefarious act on the part of GSTF’s principal’s wife and you being “pressured” into some action, only belies your weakness of character, and argument on the subject. The “friend of a friend” was probably acting in your best interest (a libelous lawsuit) when he/she advised you to remove your initial mal-intended posting. The cause to which you have self-appointed yourself is a needed one, but the manner in which you have conducted yourself, with respect to GSTF undermines a noble effort. On the outset you state “In my opinion, no legitimate publisher would ever make such a statement or allow so much unoriginal content to be published as if it were new in their journals.”, and that is exactly what it is; your opinion, not a statement of authority or fact! “
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Prof Emanuel S. Grant, Ph.D.
