Dear all,
The discussions in the last week left me with a
slightly bitter taste. There seem to be two
intentions to publish:
- to 'disseminate information',
- to satisfy administrative requirements.
The second intention is becoming so important,
that the first one is only for 'a happy few' who
can afford to wait to present worthwhile
materials.
An enormous group of authors has to put pressure
on reviewers and editors because:
- I need this publication to start a PhD
- I need this publication to obtain a PhD
- I need this publication to support my PhD-viva
- I need this publication for staff evaluations
- Our department needs this publication for an assessment/accreditation
The financial and personal consequences of the
decisions of reviewers and editors are
substantial. Administrators base their decisions
on the views of editors and reviewers: 'it has
been peer reviewed, so it must be good'.
Despite the severe consequences for the authors,
we still expect that 'reviewing' and 'editing'
must be done for free. It's part of the fun, but
it requires a lot of time. I'm afraid that this
has reached its limits.
Option 1: The example of open review processes
Chris Rust mentions on biomedcentral.com provides
a real alternative. Direct contact between
authors and reviewers with the aim to
'disseminate and discuss' new findings.
Wonderful. Unfortunately, there is another side.
The instructions for authors state:
- "Acta Veterinaria Scandinavica" levies an
article-processing charge for every accepted
article, to cover the costs incurred by open
access publication. In 2008 the
article-processing charge is £1000 (¤1260,
US$2000)."
or
- "AIDS Research and Therapy" levies an
article-processing charge for every accepted
article, to cover the costs incurred by open
access publication. In 2008 the
article-processing charge is £850 (¤1070,
US$1700)."
In other words: If you want to publish, you pay
per article. Now it is possible to calculate the
costs of the administrative policies.
Option 2: An alternative requirement for a
PhD-student could be to set up at least one
'digital peer-reviewed academic journal'. That
will solve many of the problems mentioned this
week.
biomedcentral.com makes the second option fairly painless:
http://www.biomedcentral.com/independent/starting
Nobody will have time to read much of it, but
that is not the aim. The aim is to satisfy the
administrative requirements in such a way that we
can still have a few enjoyable discussions about
the topics that really matter with people that we
really like to work with.
The domain names
http://www.designresearchcentral.com and
http://www.desrescentral.com are still available
...
Kind regards,
Karel.
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