teena clerke wrote:
> Your suggestion, a 'digital peer-reviewed academic journal' is quite
> appropriate, not too intimidating and performs the functions of
> dissemination, 'learning the ropes' and generating constructive feedback
Hi Teena,
Actually I think you have misread Karel. Although he has rather
frivolously suggested that each student starts their own peer-reviewed
journal, digital journals, especially those on BiomedCentral, are every
bit as serious as paper ones. BiomedCentral was set up to provide an
alternative to the very expensive and exclusive (in intellectual
property terms) established academic publishers, it is notable that
research funding bodies support Biomed and other open-access publishers
and are happy to meet the publishing costs per article mentioned by
Karel to ensure open access to the research results they have paid for.
Unfortunately, running a journal (or a conference) is a difficult,
time-consuming and expensive task, that's the main reason why there has
not been a flood of new online journals despite the much lower
"printing" costs. It is nearly as time-consuming and expensive to run a
journal with relatively weak peer review, the only way to make it easier
and cheaper is to have no peer review. I sometimes wonder which
well-regarded editors have pulled off this trick.
Actually the open review journals of BiomedCentral are very scary indeed
for some people because every version of your paper, and every comment
by referees and the wider audience is permanently on record for the
whole world to see. You do not go into that arena lightly.
best
Chris
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