4 ms·

Medical Ethics: Why obscure Indian journal has impressive international stature

78 points by ozdave 10y ago

denzil_correa 10y ago
> And, importantly for an ethics journal, the IJME seems to be operating pretty ethically. It doesn’t charge authors a fee to publish, and its articles are available online to everyone for free (the print edition carries a modest annual subscription fee). It doesn’t accept advertising from drug companies or medical device manufacturers, Jesani said. In the world of paying for _open access_ to publicly funded research, this journal offers a refreshing working model.
- JadeNB 10y ago
  > And, importantly for an ethics journal, the IJME seems to be operating pretty ethically. It doesn’t charge authors a fee to publish, and its articles are available online to everyone for free (the print edition carries a modest annual subscription fee). I don't like paying for publication or for access, but I've always accepted, perhaps naïvely, that something like the former is literally the price of avoiding the latter, and never regarded it as unethical. How does the journal support itself? (At a quick skim, the article didn't seem to say.)
  - brohee 10y ago
    It does say. Small staff of 1.5 people paid by philanthropist...
    - JadeNB 10y ago
      Ah, thanks. In that case, it's hard to see what lessons should be drawn by other journals, other than "try to win the favour of a rich donor". (Even "have a small staff" doesn't seem useful, given the near-0 incoming funds from publishing, until the rich donor is attracted.) To be clear, I don't mean to knock this journal! It is good to see the response to sufficient funding being ethical behaviour, rather than more money grubbing.
      - Mz 10y ago
        Fuller quote: The staff is 1.5 full-time employees — whose salaries are paid for by donations from individuals and philanthropies — and a cadre of volunteers. This totally provides some idea of how to do this well. With things like Patreon, it is absolutely not necessary to first find a rich donor. In fact, I would be leery of depending too much on a single rich donor as that is another potential source of bias if, at some point, the rich donor decides they don't like something.
  - denzil_correa 10y ago
    > I've always accepted, perhaps naïvely, that something like the former is literally the price of avoiding the latter, and never regarded it as unethical. The problem is not that you pay but HOW much you pay. An Open Access in ACM would cost $1700 for a journal and $900 for a conference article [0]. That cost is ridiculous to host online PDFs. [0] http://authors.acm.org/main.html http://authors.acm.org/main.html
    - JadeNB 10y ago
      > That cost is ridiculous to host online PDFs. Agreed, but: without defending the pricing practices of journals (I don't know much about it, but assume that there's just as much predatory pricing in OA as, if not more than, in traditional journals), if that's all you want, then you can post your PDF on the arXiv for free. The journal purports to add some value—at the very least, it adds the prestige of being published in that journal, which I imagine for many of us is literally the only advantage over the arXiv.
      - denzil_correa 10y ago
        > The journal purports to add some value—at the very least, it adds the prestige of being published in that journal, which I imagine for many of us is literally the only advantage over the arXiv. The journal in itself does not ANY value. The people who peer review the articles in journal do it at no cost. The articles are completely written by authors. The ONLY value that the journal adds is by hosting online PDFs.
        gradstudent 10y ago
        > The journal in itself does not ANY value. The people who peer review the articles in journal do it at no cost. The articles are completely written by authors. The ONLY value that the journal adds is by hosting online PDFs. I suppose if you are not a practicing scientist the difference between a PDF hosted by a journal and a PDF on arXiv can seem irrelevant. It is not. Good journals have an effective peer review process that requires editors who will curate articles, match them with expert reviewers and subsequently provide their own meta review on the paper and the process. All of this is a valuable contribution that goes way beyond simply hosting a PDF. Even good work is genuinely improved by going through this process.
arjie 10y ago
Neat. My dad was the Editor of this journal until a couple of years ago and I've worked with the people who work on it.

78 points by ozdave 10y ago

> And, importantly for an ethics journal, the IJME seems to be operating pretty ethically. It doesn’t charge authors a fee to publish, and its articles are available online to everyone for free (the print edition carries a modest annual subscription fee). It doesn’t accept advertising from drug companies or medical device manufacturers, Jesani said. In the world of paying for _open access_ to publicly funded research, this journal offers a refreshing working model.

JadeNB 10y ago
> And, importantly for an ethics journal, the IJME seems to be operating pretty ethically. It doesn’t charge authors a fee to publish, and its articles are available online to everyone for free (the print edition carries a modest annual subscription fee). I don't like paying for publication or for access, but I've always accepted, perhaps naïvely, that something like the former is literally the price of avoiding the latter, and never regarded it as unethical. How does the journal support itself? (At a quick skim, the article didn't seem to say.)
- brohee 10y ago
  It does say. Small staff of 1.5 people paid by philanthropist...
  - JadeNB 10y ago
    Ah, thanks. In that case, it's hard to see what lessons should be drawn by other journals, other than "try to win the favour of a rich donor". (Even "have a small staff" doesn't seem useful, given the near-0 incoming funds from publishing, until the rich donor is attracted.) To be clear, I don't mean to knock this journal! It is good to see the response to sufficient funding being ethical behaviour, rather than more money grubbing.
    - Mz 10y ago
      Fuller quote: The staff is 1.5 full-time employees — whose salaries are paid for by donations from individuals and philanthropies — and a cadre of volunteers. This totally provides some idea of how to do this well. With things like Patreon, it is absolutely not necessary to first find a rich donor. In fact, I would be leery of depending too much on a single rich donor as that is another potential source of bias if, at some point, the rich donor decides they don't like something.
- denzil_correa 10y ago
  > I've always accepted, perhaps naïvely, that something like the former is literally the price of avoiding the latter, and never regarded it as unethical. The problem is not that you pay but HOW much you pay. An Open Access in ACM would cost $1700 for a journal and $900 for a conference article [0]. That cost is ridiculous to host online PDFs. [0] http://authors.acm.org/main.html http://authors.acm.org/main.html
  - JadeNB 10y ago
    > That cost is ridiculous to host online PDFs. Agreed, but: without defending the pricing practices of journals (I don't know much about it, but assume that there's just as much predatory pricing in OA as, if not more than, in traditional journals), if that's all you want, then you can post your PDF on the arXiv for free. The journal purports to add some value—at the very least, it adds the prestige of being published in that journal, which I imagine for many of us is literally the only advantage over the arXiv.
    - denzil_correa 10y ago
      > The journal purports to add some value—at the very least, it adds the prestige of being published in that journal, which I imagine for many of us is literally the only advantage over the arXiv. The journal in itself does not ANY value. The people who peer review the articles in journal do it at no cost. The articles are completely written by authors. The ONLY value that the journal adds is by hosting online PDFs.
      - gradstudent 10y ago
        > The journal in itself does not ANY value. The people who peer review the articles in journal do it at no cost. The articles are completely written by authors. The ONLY value that the journal adds is by hosting online PDFs. I suppose if you are not a practicing scientist the difference between a PDF hosted by a journal and a PDF on arXiv can seem irrelevant. It is not. Good journals have an effective peer review process that requires editors who will curate articles, match them with expert reviewers and subsequently provide their own meta review on the paper and the process. All of this is a valuable contribution that goes way beyond simply hosting a PDF. Even good work is genuinely improved by going through this process.

arjie 10y ago

Neat. My dad was the Editor of this journal until a couple of years ago and I've worked with the people who work on it.