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The scientific publishing industry is corrupt and needs to burn. What's stopping scientists from just not publishing in those for-profit journals? I mean, it'

by refurb 4y ago

The scientific publishing industry is corrupt and needs to burn. What's stopping scientists from just not publishing in those for-profit journals? I mean, it's their paper.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
codebje 4y ago
Institutions often reward publication in more impactful journals, and careers are built on your publication history. Journals also often require that you assign copyright to them and restrict your ability to publish in more accessible places.
kerkeslager 4y ago
Universities expect you to have publications in peer-reviewed journals. In many fields there aren't alternatives to for-profit journals, and in fields which do have alternatives, many academics don't know the alternatives exist.
thrdbndndn 4y ago
I think a common misunderstanding, often held on HN/Reddit, is that the academia themselves also hate journal publishing industry as much. I mean, of course none of us like them, and everyone hates the pressure that you have to publish papers to keep your job or to be promoted. But all these are independent to how the industry makes money and especially very irrelevant to the fact that most of journals aren't open-access. Almost all universities/institutions have subscriptions of majority of journals. And most "proper" journals don't charge you (the authors) a fee to publish. Yes, they usually don't pay you when they asked you to review, which sucks. But the whole thing isn't as bad from a practical perspective. Again it's still a annoyance from time to time, just not that bad. Furthermore, unfortunately, a way to judge how good you're at research would be needed anyway. If the journal publishing industry died overnight, there would be other metric coming up and as toxic. TL;DR: scientific publishing industry is a leech but they leech on the fact scientists/researchers needing a way to build their prestige. Not on them directly. That's why most don't have a too strong opinion or act on it.
- asdff 4y ago
  >And most "proper" journals don't charge you (the authors) a fee to publish I've not noticed this in biology. Most journals charge a couple thousand to publish. The only exception I can think of are the plos journals. And they also never ever pay you to review.
  - thrdbndndn 4y ago
    Interesting, I guess it varies by field then. I apologize for making blanket statement. In engineering, at least as far as I encountered, only some shady journals would charge you.
GuB-42 4y ago
The way I understand it, journals are essentially grading agencies. Good journals try to only publish good papers, the best journal are the best at this. So, to show that your papers are good, you show that they have been published in good journals.

by refurb 4y ago

The scientific publishing industry is corrupt and needs to burn. What's stopping scientists from just not publishing in those for-profit journals? I mean, it's their paper.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

codebje 4y ago

Institutions often reward publication in more impactful journals, and careers are built on your publication history. Journals also often require that you assign copyright to them and restrict your ability to publish in more accessible places.

kerkeslager 4y ago

Universities expect you to have publications in peer-reviewed journals. In many fields there aren't alternatives to for-profit journals, and in fields which do have alternatives, many academics don't know the alternatives exist.

thrdbndndn 4y ago

I think a common misunderstanding, often held on HN/Reddit, is that the academia themselves also hate journal publishing industry as much. I mean, of course none of us like them, and everyone hates the pressure that you have to publish papers to keep your job or to be promoted. But all these are independent to how the industry makes money and especially very irrelevant to the fact that most of journals aren't open-access. Almost all universities/institutions have subscriptions of majority of journals. And most "proper" journals don't charge you (the authors) a fee to publish. Yes, they usually don't pay you when they asked you to review, which sucks. But the whole thing isn't as bad from a practical perspective. Again it's still a annoyance from time to time, just not that bad. Furthermore, unfortunately, a way to judge how good you're at research would be needed anyway. If the journal publishing industry died overnight, there would be other metric coming up and as toxic. TL;DR: scientific publishing industry is a leech but they leech on the fact scientists/researchers needing a way to build their prestige. Not on them directly. That's why most don't have a too strong opinion or act on it.

asdff 4y ago
>And most "proper" journals don't charge you (the authors) a fee to publish I've not noticed this in biology. Most journals charge a couple thousand to publish. The only exception I can think of are the plos journals. And they also never ever pay you to review.
- thrdbndndn 4y ago
  Interesting, I guess it varies by field then. I apologize for making blanket statement. In engineering, at least as far as I encountered, only some shady journals would charge you.

GuB-42 4y ago

The way I understand it, journals are essentially grading agencies. Good journals try to only publish good papers, the best journal are the best at this. So, to show that your papers are good, you show that they have been published in good journals.