On Publishing and the Sneetches: A Wake-Up Call?
The knowledge that we produce in our publicly funded works belongs to humankind and must not be locked up behind pay-walls— newly submitted papers should be open-access and older ones open-archive.
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Peer Review Needs To Be More Transparent If We Want Better Science
How should the scientific publication process be rethought to be more meritocratic?
Funders and Publishers as Agents of Change
Funders and publishers have something in common: for better or worse, we have the ability to influence the behavior of researchers.
Publisher Pulls 58 Articles by Iranian Scientists Over Authorship Manipulation
Publisher Pulls 58 Articles by Iranian Scientists Over Authorship Manipulation
Cull of papers follows similar discoveries in 2015.
Examples of Bad Peer Review and Why It Is Damaging to Researchers
Peer review publications remain a key stage in the quality assurance of new research, but some comments can be the stuff of nightmares.
The Best of Both Worlds
For some time now PLOS has discussed new initiatives designed to accelerate research communication.
Citations Increase with Manuscript Length, Author Number, and References Cited in Ecology Journals
Citations Increase with Manuscript Length, Author Number, and References Cited in Ecology Journals
A paper that suggests that the imposition of arbitrary manuscript length limits discourages the publication of more impactful studies.
High Impact, Fast Decisions and Reasonable Rejection Rates
Rejection rates in Frontiers journals are around ~27%, most manuscripts are published within 3 months, and yet, Frontiers’ citations rates are amongst the very highest.
Aim High, Publish Fast
New service offers a rigorous independent peer review and helps you publish quickly in the best possible journal. Submission is free.
Are Mega-Journals the Future, a Stepping Stone to It or a Leap into the Abyss?
Nature’s new kid on the block Scientific Reports is now the biggest journal in the world. But while such giants are currently overturning the world of scholarly publishing, their long-term future is unclear.
Stop Submitting Papers
We should write our draft, go over it with our co-authors, and then put it on a preprint server. And wait. After a year, when we had the opportunity to share this paper with colleagues, then we can submit it.
Building a sustainable future for eLife
To support the long-term growth of eLife we are going to introduce a publication fee of $2500
Gender bias found in Earth-science society journals
Women publish and review less than men in American Geophysical Union journals, but have a higher acceptance rate.
Open-access journal eLife to start charging fees
The open-access journal eLife is dropping one of its most distinctive features: free publishing. From 2017, it will charge a fee of $2,500 for all accepted papers.
The current system of knowledge dissemination isn’t working and Sci-Hub is merely a symptom of the problem
The current system of knowledge dissemination isn’t working and Sci-Hub is merely a symptom of the problem
That Sci-Hub’s activities are illegal is not disputed. However, according to Iván Farías Pelcastre and Flor González Correa the issue at the core of the debate is the current publishing and knowled…
A cross-disciplinary approach to science is helping Nautilus carve a unique niche in science publishing
A cross-disciplinary approach to science is helping Nautilus carve a unique niche in science publishing
With a focus on deep reporting, a print magazine, and an intense affinity for illustrations, nonprofit Nautilus has taken an expensive approach to launching a new science publication.
The natural selection of bad science
Poor research design and data analysis encourage false-positive findings. Such poor methods persist despite perennial calls for improvement, suggesting that they result from something more than just misunderstanding.
Cut-throat academia leads to 'natural selection of bad science'
Scientists incentivised to publish surprising results frequently in major journals, despite risk that such findings are likely to be wrong, suggests research.
Robot-written reviews fool academics
Peer reviews created by self-generated text machines are the latest threat to scientific integrity.
The FTC Is Cracking Down on Predatory Science Journals
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is suing predatory journal publishing company, OMICS Group, for hiding fees and deceiving researchers. It's a first for the largely unregulated industry.
Why scientific criticism sometimes needs to hurt
As a researcher who gets such severe criticism, you have to go through the 5 stages of grief...
New Editor-in-Chief of PLOS ONE
Dr. Joerg Heber has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of PLOS ONE.
How has publishing changed in the last 20 years?
It is useful to consider the trajectory of both scientific and literary publishing on the grid-group plane defined by Mary Douglas which arranges attitudes along two axes: one ranging from the hierarchical to the egalitarian, and the other spanning individualistic to communitarian. I would contend that, in both cases, there has been a move from the hierarchical/communitarian quadrant towards the egalitarian/individualistic zone.
EMBO and Wiley launch the SmartFigures Lab
‘SmartFigures Lab’ is a prototype online publishing website with enhanced data presentation capabilities. The site results from the integration of SmartFigures, an open source application of the EMBO SourceData platform, with Wiley’s Content Enrichment Framework and research & development environment.
Truth in Science Publishing
In this Perspective, Thomas C. Südhof describes some of the current challenges to the peer review system that have endangered public acceptance of science and discusses possible avenues to addressing these challenges.
Elsevier Awarded U.S. Patent For “Online Peer Review System and Method”
A few hours ago, 50 months after Elsevier submitted a patent application for an “Online peer review system and method” the patent was awarded to the company.
UC Pay It Forward Project
UC Davis and CDL Investigation of the Institutional Costs of Gold Open Access
Towards Open Science: The Case for a Decentralized Autonomous Academic Endorsement System
Towards Open Science: The Case for a Decentralized Autonomous Academic Endorsement System
A system of academic endorsement based on blockchain technology would be decoupled from the publication process, which would allow expeditious appraisal of all kinds of scientific output in a transparent manner without relying on any central authority.
Foot print of a paper: accountability in academic publishing
There needs to be a transparent and openly recorded submission and review process.
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