Comment on The Scientific World Journal Will Lose Its Impact Factor — Again by Farzad

The way that The scientific world journal is treated by Thomson Reuters is grotesque and suggests some prejudice which may have played a part in their decision. There is no doubt that Hindawi publication has a long way to go to reach the quality and reputation of some other publishers like Elsevier or Springer. However, it can not be denied that Hindawi is a rising new power in the academic community, which to some extent, challenges veteran publishers. We know that the margin profit of Hindawi surpassed that of Elsevier some time ago. I am not interested in putting forward some conspiracy theories and claim that those long-established and influential publishers may try to perniciously impact Hindawi through the tools such as Thomson Reuters, but excuse of self-citation provided by Thomson Reuters for removing The scientific world journal or Abstract and Applied Analysis from their list sounds not only unconvincing but rather flimsy. Ironically, if self-citation is going to establish a criterion for preserving or tarnishing reputation of Thomson Reuters or scientific community , then, many Elsevier or Springer-operated journals must either be dropped from JCR or lose their impact factor.