Paying for Impact: Does the Chinese Model Make Sense?
In many Chinese universities, authors are paid to publish. And the more prestigious the journal, the higher the reward.
Gaming the System: Do Promises of Citation Advantage Go Too Far?
Promises of more citations if authors pay are problematic in more ways than one.
J.C. Penney's Black Hat SEO and Google — Why the Network Doesn't Justify Impact Proxies
The outer ring of citation remains a point of vulnerability for quality proxies, as does reducing complex things to simple lists or numbers. When will we learn?
How Meaningful and Reliable Are Social Article Metrics?
New publishing initiatives link concepts like “importance” to social metrics like popularity and sharing. Is this logical? Can these metrics be easily gamed?
Phil's Pick for 2010: The Unintended Use of a Blog Post
A traffic phenomenon from a post about PLoS ONE may indicate that impact factors are more important to authors than PLoS believes.
Post-Publication Review: Does It Add Anything New and Useful?
Post-publication review is spotty, unreliable, and may suffer from cronyism, several studies reveal.
Impact Factor Inflation: When an Increase is Actually a Decrease
Journals that fail to keep up with background Impact Factor inflation may actually be losing ground.
Cups, Buckets, Pools, and Puddles: When the Flood of Papers Won’t Abate, Which Do You Choose?
When most papers submitted ultimately get published, and in an age driven by pooled philosophies and practices, are we already participating in a “filter failure” of immense proportions?
PLoS ONE: Is a High Impact Factor a Blessing or a Curse?
PLoS ONE’s relatively high impact factor may compromise its ability to support PLoS Biology and PLoS Medicine.
Impact Factors — A Self-fulfilling Prophecy?
A new study analyzing the citation performance of identical articles in multiple sources provides new insight into the causes of citation. But does it accomplish its goals?
Is It Still Disruption When You’ve Done It Yourself?
The fact that scientific publishing hasn’t been disrupted may be a sign of a problem, not an advantage. A future choice may be disruption or irrelevance. Which will we choose?
Should Editors Influence Journal Impact Factors?
Is it ethical for editors to alert authors of relevant in-journal articles?
How Meaningful Are User Ratings? (This Article = 4.5 Stars!)
Are user rating systems a good way of measuring the quality of an author’s research? More and more websites are abandoning 5-star rating systems as the results they give are deeply flawed. PLoS’ approach will probably suffer the same problems.
PLoS Releases Article-level Metrics
Moving beyond citations, publisher paints broader picture of quality with palette of performance indicators.
Naughty Twins and the Impact of Journals
Unethical republication has created a unique opportunity to study the effect of journals on article citations.