[GOAL] Still on the scientific open access journals in Brazil - response to Heather Morrison

Mon Mar 30 20:36:17 BST 2015

1.  re:  "whether editing and peer review are slow or fast depend on factors such as speed of communication and do not necessarily reflect quality" ... this may be valid in a theory, but as a general rule, I would suggest that speed is more likely a result of a cursory review than of any increase in 'speed of communication'.

2. re: "reviewers and editors of quality scholarly journals do not take weeks or months to review, accept or reject articles." ... this statement, in regards STM publishing is patently untrue.  An honest peer review may result in requests for a variety of additions/changes to the original manuscript.

In regards the time it takes between submission and publication. Here is some data on articles from the first 2015 issue of J. Am. Chem. Soc.

Communications:

Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: December 22, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: December 08, 2014
Received: August 17, 2014
------------------------
Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: December 31, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: December 25, 2014
Received: August 17, 2014
--------------------------
Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: December 23, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: December 17, 2014
Received: August 21, 2014
----------------------------
Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: December 29, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: November 25, 2014
Received: September 09, 2014
------------------------------
Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: December 22, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: November 21, 2014
Received: September 11, 2014
---------------------------------
Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
 Article ASAP: December 26, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: December 18, 2014
Received: September 30, 2014
--------------------------------------------------
Articles:

Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: December 22, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: December 05, 2014
Received: July 11, 2014
----------------------------------------
Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: December 26, 2014
Just Accepted Manuscript: December 10, 2014
Received: July 23, 2014
-----------------------------------------
Published In Issue: January 14, 2015
Article ASAP: January 02, 2015
Just Accepted Manuscript: December 19, 2014
Received: July 25, 2014
-----------------------------------------

It is also generally recognized that mathematics articles are extremely slow to be reviewed.

In regards, Web of Science, one of their major problems is the absence of ASAP articles, in contrast to PubMed and SciFinder.  Since Web of Science waits for the formal publication of complete journal issues, this causes an additional delay in possible retrieval from their database, making PubMed or SciFinder the choice for very recently published articles.

Dana L. Roth
Millikan Library / Caltech 1-32
1200 E. California Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91125
626-395-6423 fax 626-792-7540
dzrlib at library.caltech.edu
http://library.caltech.edu/collections/chemistry.htm
________________________________________
From: goal-bounces at eprints.org [goal-bounces at eprints.org] on behalf of Heather Morrison [Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca]
Sent: Monday, March 30, 2015 7:11 AM
To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci)
Subject: [GOAL] Re: Still on the scientific open access journals in Brazil - response to Mister Jeffrey Beall

Some questions and comments for Mauricio Tuffani. In brief, I question whether Brazilian authors are actually publishing in the journals included in Beall's list, note that whether editing and peer review are slow or fast depend on factors such as speed of communication and do not necessarily reflect quality, and I wonder whether a quadrupling of Brazilian authors' articles in Web of Science really reflects productivity, or increased acceptance of Brazilian authors and/or journals in Web of Science.

Details

Whether the inclusion of journals on Beall's list of "Potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly open-access publishers" in Qualis means that Brazilian authors are actually publishing in these journals is a hypothesis that needs to be tested. I would predict that few (possibly even no) articles by Brazilian authors would be found in these journals. One reason for my hypothesis is that many such journals have low publication rates. For example, Tuffani points to the OMICS Journal of Clinical & Experimental Cardiology: http://rs.gs/wcS. This journal appears to publish monthly, with a total of about 3 - 4 research articles per issue and 1 -2 case reports. Quickly glancing at a few issues, I do not see any evidence suggesting this is a venue used by Brazilian authors. Also, the policy for this journals is that articles are only accepted in English; would this not discourage submissions from researchers writing in Portuguese? To determine whether inclusion of these journals in Qualis reflects Brazilian publishing, it would be a good idea to take at least a sample of these journals and see whether articles from Brazilian authors can be found in them.

Tuffani wrote:

"in the traditional model maintained by annual subscriptions or fees per article download from the Internet, the reputable journals take months or even over a year to review and accept articles, or rejected them.Accused of prioritizing minimizing costs and maximizing profits, the "predatory publishers" not only reduce to a few weeks the acceptance of articles..."

Comment: reviewers and editors of quality scholarly journals do not take weeks or months to review, accept or reject articles. A good reviewer might spend a half day to a day on a review. The lengthy time of traditional journals for this work reflects the development of such journals in a system where both production and dissemination relied on print. Authors used to have to send (by mail) several print copies of articles to editors for review. The editor would then have to mail the articles to reviewers, who would then read, review, and return the articles to the editors also by mail. Every step of the review process - questions from reviewers to editors to authors - would require a repeat of this multi-step process, with delays based on print / mail at every step. Automated journal management software using the internet for communications eliminates these delays in communications. An editor can send a request for review to a potential reviewer asking them to indicate their willingness and availability to review within days. If the reviewer is not available, the editor can move on to find someone else. Traditional journals, even those still publishing in print, that have not speeded up their editing and review process are not taking advantage of the technology available today.

Question: Tuffani wrote that "the number of published articles nearly quadrupled since 2000". The source cited is Web of Science. Has the number of articles written and/or published actually quadrupled since 2000, or does some or all of this difference reflect an increase in coverage of Brazilian authors in Web of Science? The former suggests enhanced productivity (which could be due to any of a number of factors; it is highly unlikely that the difference reflects publishing in journals included on Beall's list), while the latter suggests increased international visibility of Brazilian authors (a good thing for Brazilian scholarship).

best,

--
Dr. Heather Morrison
Assistant Professor
École des sciences de l'information / School of Information Studies
Cross-appointed to the Department of Communication
University of Ottawa
http://www.sis.uottawa.ca/faculty/hmorrison.html
Sustaining the Knowledge Commons http://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/
Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca

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