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People keep on saying that academic journals provide no value, since all of the work is being done by the scientists anyway. I have another take on this. I thin

People keep on saying that academic journals provide no value, since all of the work is being done by the scientists anyway. I have another take on this. I think that they're providing a (virtual) meeting place for scientists. Just like banks, whose job is to provide a meeting place for people who want to stash away their money in a deposit and other people who need to buy a new house. From this point of view, the sooner journals stop extorting readers for reading the articles, the better. The readers are innocent bystanders in this game, and in any case free distribution of research is in the best interest of the players (the scientists).

nefitty 11y ago
Your metaphor is a bit confusing. Do you mean that both services depend on the network effect to provide value? The more scientists contribute and take from a piece of work, the better it becomes, and the more people deposit and borrow from one bank the more it can provide for new customers. The comparison might be a stretch but I can see where you were going with it.
- KKKKkkkk1 11y ago
  If I saved some money, I'd rather stash it in a trustworthy institution like Bank of America (bear with me for a moment) than search for someone to lend it to on my own. Similarly, if I wrote a research article, I will submit my article to Nature or Science, who will find an esteemed scientist to referee my paper and give it their stamp of approval. I could try to find such a scientist directly and ask them to write an endorsement letter for my research, but Nature or Science are much more likely to be successful at this due to their stellar reputation.
  - soyiuz 11y ago
    Yes, that is true. But the filtration mechanism you are describing happens through the work of editors and peer reviewers who also get close to nothing. The value is extracted by content aggregators who don't contribute anything except aggregation, which is already provided by search engines etc...
  - alphydan 11y ago
    When you are at the cutting edge of your field (able to publish in Nature or Science), you know exactly who the peer reviewers are (there is usually only 5 to 10 teams in the world who are experts in your area). So you know it's one of 20 to 60 people (roughly). That part is actually very easy. The job the journal does is to randomly and anonymously assign the reviewer (sometimes not entirely randomly, giving it to your critics). But all that could be automated (taking into account top publishers in the field, newcomers to the field, conference publications, etc).

nefitty 11y ago

Your metaphor is a bit confusing. Do you mean that both services depend on the network effect to provide value? The more scientists contribute and take from a piece of work, the better it becomes, and the more people deposit and borrow from one bank the more it can provide for new customers. The comparison might be a stretch but I can see where you were going with it.

KKKKkkkk1 11y ago
If I saved some money, I'd rather stash it in a trustworthy institution like Bank of America (bear with me for a moment) than search for someone to lend it to on my own. Similarly, if I wrote a research article, I will submit my article to Nature or Science, who will find an esteemed scientist to referee my paper and give it their stamp of approval. I could try to find such a scientist directly and ask them to write an endorsement letter for my research, but Nature or Science are much more likely to be successful at this due to their stellar reputation.
- soyiuz 11y ago
  Yes, that is true. But the filtration mechanism you are describing happens through the work of editors and peer reviewers who also get close to nothing. The value is extracted by content aggregators who don't contribute anything except aggregation, which is already provided by search engines etc...
- alphydan 11y ago
  When you are at the cutting edge of your field (able to publish in Nature or Science), you know exactly who the peer reviewers are (there is usually only 5 to 10 teams in the world who are experts in your area). So you know it's one of 20 to 60 people (roughly). That part is actually very easy. The job the journal does is to randomly and anonymously assign the reviewer (sometimes not entirely randomly, giving it to your critics). But all that could be automated (taking into account top publishers in the field, newcomers to the field, conference publications, etc).