The Art of the Beall
After deleting his predatory publishing list, librarian Jeffrey Beall reemerges into the spotlight with a self-published book about art forgeries.
An Interview with Jeffrey Beall
An interview with librarian and open access skeptic Jeffrey Beall. He discusses his work, the criteria for declaring an organization a “predatory publisher,” and how he would fix the scholarly communications system.
Notes on Publishing in an Emerging Economy
Well-intended government policy in an Eastern European nation is having unexpected results on school publishing, some of which are the precise opposite of what policymakers had hoped for. The problem is that those who draft policy have little imagination about how new programs will be taken up–and altered–in the marketplace.
Defending Regional Excellence in Research or Why Beall is Wrong About SciELO
Last week, Jeffery Beall wrote a highly critical blog past of Brazilian publishing co-operative and citation index SciELO. The post generated significant backlash in the blogosphere and on Twitter. Important aspects of the discussion seemed to get drowned out in all the furor: the motivation for SciELO’s founding in the first place and the need to protect local excellence in scholarly research.
Knockoffs Erode Trust in Metrics Market
If the Internet created a burgeoning market of cheap academic journal knockoffs, should we be surprised to witness new knockoff ratings companies?
Making a Case for Open Access
Some professional societies need to be persuaded that open access publishing may be in their interest. The best way to do this is to provide data on the publishing ecosystem, including such things as the number of articles of interest to a society that appear in other venues and the practical implications of not having an OA option for prospective authors.
Housecleaning at the Directory of Open Access Journals
The DOAJ is kicking out hundreds of predatory and scam publishers that found their way into the directory, and tightening standards to ensure that they don’t sneak back in. Which makes things a bit awkward for a community that, for years, has been insisting that predatory OA publishing isn’t a problem worth worrying about.
Identity Theft of the Scholarly Kind
Building a reputation can take decades for a society, publisher or journal. Unfortunately, the influential “seals of approval” in the industry are easy to spoof leaving some authors confused and deceived.
Parting Company with Jeffrey Beall
Although Jeffrey Beall has done us all a good service by coming up with his list of predatory publishers, his arguments against open access publishing have become shrill and reveal that he is expressing a political viewpoint that obscures the many gradations of opinion concerning scholarly publishing.
The Natural Limits of Gold Open Access
Gold open access publishing has proved to be successful, but it has certain limitations. This essay probes what those limitations are, but it argues that OA’s limitations do not outweigh its strengths. Gold OA most usefully coexists with traditional publishing models.
Open Access "Sting" Reveals Deception, Missed Opportunities
What can be learned from John Bohannon’s investigative study of open access publishers?
Predators and Prey — The Plot Thickens
Strange comments emerge after a post about Beall’s list of “predatory” publishers appears, many of which attribute sentiments to people falsely.
High Noon — A Publisher Threatens to "Lunch" a Criminal Case Against Librarian Critic
Another publisher sues a librarian for opinions expressed on a blog. This time, the publisher is demanding $1 billion in damages and $10,000 for having to write the threatening letter in the first place.