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Dear Victor and list, Thanks Victor for introducing this issue. I fully agree with you. This is becoming a growing problem. The oversight of academic publication decisions should be in the hands of the same research community that it serves. I would like to support Victor's statement and hope that all of us take our individual responsibility when it comes to this issue. Erik *--------------------------------------------------- Erik Stolterman *http://transground.blogspot.com/ Organizational Design Competence<http://www.organizationaldesigncompetence.com/> On Mon, Nov 7, 2011 at 11:02 AM, Victor Margolin <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Colleagues; > I would like to open a discussion on this list about the growing number of > commercial conferences and on-line journals that invite participation from > scholars. A recent on-line journal from SAGE invites scholars to submit > their articles to a broad on-line journal on the humanities and social > sciences. SAGE promises peer review but doesn't give any indication of who > the peers are. We have already had a discussion about the pitfalls of the > Common Ground design conference and ensuing publication, both of which are > set up to separate scholars from their dollars, pounds, Euros, or zlotys. > The SAGE journal charges scholars $195 for publication and promises the > validation of a peer review and on line publication. Others are similar. As > with Common Ground, these journals publish lists of prominent scholars who > are supposedly on their advisory boards. Some of these scholars may agree > without thinking enough about what they are doing. Others are surprised to > find their names on such lists. These tendencies and others to come, fueled > by a growing number of PhDs who need to publish, will only confuse our > field and other academic fields. They are not meaningful places to publish > nor are they set up to foster discussion and debate in any particular > field. My own opinion is that we would be better off without them. They > represent a kind of inflation and meaningless activity that is not good for > the global academic economy. > Victor > > Victor Margolin > Professor Emeritus of Design History > Department of Art History > University of Illinois, Chicago >