Editorial
Authors and readers beware the dark side of Open Access Open access publishing has expanded dramatically over the last decade. For the most part, this works to everyone’s advantage, enabling important, cutting-edge science to get to readers sooner than by more traditional publication methods. JAN supports open access initiatives including its periodic Virtual Issues program and providing a full open access publication option. Many journals and respectable publishing houses offer similar choices and there are also open-access-only publishers whose publishing standards match those of JAN. However, this is not the case for all open access only publishers. The concept of predatory publishing has emerged from the open access publishing movement. The term ‘predatory open access,’ was introduced by University of Colorado librarian and researcher Jeffrey Beall, identifying the practices of some ‘publishing companies’ of soliciting papers from authors for ‘publication’ in journals that lack acceptable peer review, editorial oversight, or established procedures to protect against plagiarism, data duplication or other unethical practices. The difference between acceptable open access publishers and predatory publishers is that, while both operate on a pay-to-publish business model, predatory publishers do not follow many if not all acceptable publication standards. Predatory publishers have been known to claim to be ‘leading’ publishers even though they may be just starting. They list contact information that does not clearly indicate where they are located or use free email services for contact. Often, multiple journals from the same publisher will have the same editor and editorial board, and there have been reports of board members being appointed to these panels without their application or knowledge. These publishers do not participate in or have membership of customary organizations such as the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE; http://publicationethics.org/) or the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE; http://www.icmje.org/about-icmje/). Open access has certainly been a driver for predatory publishing, but as the pressure on academics to publish © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
grows and the criteria for academic promotion increasingly expect large volumes of papers, the activities of such predatory journals may find an ever growing market of authors (Bartholomew 2014). We must be clear about the motives of this section of the publishing ‘industry’; predation is aimed, first and foremost, at getting authors’ money rather than ensuring that published papers contribute to science. Predatory publishers tend not to give the editorial and publishing services and amenities for readers associated with established and legitimate journals – no RSS feeds, clickable references or letters to the editor and the review process for papers is notably short, often just a few days. Authors and editors are regularly mail-shot with ‘invitations’ to submit articles or join editorial boards of journals we have never heard of. Most just delete these (typically) email messages. The consequences can be far reaching for those who do not. Papers solicited via email require the author to transfer copyright of the paper upon submission. For potential authors, it is not always clear that once papers are accepted they will be charged a fee for publication; this financial information is usually elsewhere on the journal website. Predatory journals often have a very broad scope (i.e. Journal of Nursing) or combine fields not typically linked (i.e. Journal of Nursing, Business, and Technology), which allows them to attract more papers and revenue from authors. Since predatory journals are not generally indexed, published papers will not appear in widely used databases such as CINAHL or PubMed: papers will be hard for readers to find. Authors are also sought to edit special issues on topics that match their research interests. Once recruited, ‘editors’ are encouraged to create marketing material with their names attached, and to solicit papers from their networks of colleagues in exchange for a small reduction in the publication fee of their own articles. Predatory publishers have also been known to operate alongside predatory conference organisers and to tout the offer of publication in conference proceedings. Presenters are invited to speak by a personalized invitation that does not at first glance appear mass-marketing, on any issue broadly relating to a wide topic. Potential presenters are often directed to websites that show the important speakers who have already agreed to attend, but it is generally not made clear 1
Editorial
that the speaker pays for the privilege of attending and having their conference contribution published in the book of proceedings. Conference papers may be accepted unconditionally for publication if the speaker agrees to fund themselves to attend the conference. Typically, papers receive no editing, are published ‘as is’, and lack ISSN (http://www.issn.org/) or DOI (http://www.doi.org/) numbers. Journal editors have become increasing concerned by predatory publishing practices. The resignations of the Editor-inChief and the entire nine member editorial board of the Open Access journal, Advances in Anthropology, were reported recently in the COPE news digest. The former Editor-inChief, Dr. Fatimah Jackson, was quoted as saying that she and the board resigned ‘after consistent and flagrant unethical breaches by the editorial staff in China’, who were allegedly not engaging appropriately with the board regarding peer review and manuscript decisions. Dr Jackson explained that she and the board thought the publisher was focused on making money, and was using them as a ‘front’ to distract attention from their publication practices. Several responses have been set in train. Beall (2012) has set up ‘Beall’s List’ of publishers and journals that demonstrate predatory criteria (http://scholarlyoa.com/publishers/), and these criteria are posted at http://scholarlyoa.com/2012/ 11/30/criteria-for-determining-predatory-open-access-publish ers-2nd-edition/. First published in 2010, the list is updated regularly. The International Academy of Nursing Editors (INANE Predatory Publishing Practices Collaborative 2014), in collaboration with Nurse Author & Editor, publishes a directory of nursing journals (http://nursingeditors.com/journals-directory/) that have been vetted by member editors, providing a starting place for nurse authors when preparing their papers for publication. The JAN Editors have joined our nurse-editor colleagues from numerous journals and publishing houses in the Open Access Editorial Standards Project. Launched at the 33rd Annual Meeting of INANE in August 2014, the project was officially unveiled with the September 2014 publication of Nurse Author & Editor Newsletter. INANE’s decision to launch the initiative was made following presentations by Jeffrey Beall (http://scholarlyoa.com/about/) and Carolyn Yucca (editor of Biological Research in Nursing) and a lively discussion by conference attendees. The project’s purpose is to raise awareness and educate our author and reader communities about the potential detrimental effects of the emerging phenomenon of predatory publishing. Our purpose in writing this editorial is to give you, our authors and readers, information we hope will be helpful
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as you consider where to publish your work or to source reliable, properly peer-reviewed papers. There are many excellent journals in today’s publishing world and most adhere to high standards of publication practice. We encourage authors to spend time examining journals before submitting their papers. Failure to do so could result in loss of copyright of your work to an unscrupulous publisher who may never post your paper or may post it and later remove it, resulting in the loss of all your hard work. We encourage readers to consider carefully the journal source of papers you cite or use for evidence based practice; since predatory journals do not really review their papers, you may be the sole judge of such papers’ quality. In a perfect world, all authors, editors, publishers and readers would follow acceptable publication standards; we know this is not a perfect world. It is our hope that our authors do not fall prey to the enticements of predatory publishers and to the threat, first voiced by Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, to ‘publish and be damned.’ Our best advice to authors and readers is – beware. Rita Pickler, Jane Noyes, Lin Perry, Brenda Roe, Roger Watson and Mark Hayter Rita Pickler Editor JAN e-mail:
[email protected] Jane Noyes Editor JAN Lin Perry Editor JAN Brenda Roe Editor JAN Roger Watson Editor-in-Chief JAN Mark Hayter Editor JAN
© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
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References Bartholomew R.E. (2014) Science for sale: the rise of predatory journals. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 107, 384–385. Beall J. (2012) Predatory publishers are corrupting open access. Nature 489(7415), 179. COPE Digest: Publication Ethics in Practice An Editorial Board Mass-Resignation — from an Open-Access Journal October
© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Editorial 2014 (Vol. 2, Issue 10). Retrieved from http://scholarlyoa.com/ 2014/10/02/an-editorial-board-mass-resignation-from-an-openaccess-journal/#more-4251 on 28 November 2014. INANE Predatory Publishing Practices Collaborative (2014) Predatory publishing: what editors need to know. Nurse Author & Editor 24(3), 1. Retrieved from http://www.nurseauthoreditor. com/article.asp?id=261 on 28 November 2014.
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