6 ms·

Publishing in Academia is a scam. Nowadays everyone puts their papers also on arxiv.org so at least we can read each other's papers for free. While of course st

by zero_k 2y ago

Publishing in Academia is a scam. Nowadays everyone puts their papers also on arxiv.org so at least we can read each other's papers for free. While of course still paying the fees to these publishers who are doing nothing but messing up the PDF (I have to fight them to fix the mistakes they add every time a paper is published), while claiming to do a value-add, which happens to add value to nobody but their own pockets. It's a scam through and through. Of course one has to examine why this system is still in place. And it's mostly to do with policies in universities, where certain journals/conferences are valued more, and changing that is hard, because e.g. Springer happens to own the name. So we all pay millions to Springer, for the use of this name (that we, together, made great, not Springer), and in return, they charge us the privilege of reading the papers that we reviewed, edited, and wrote. It's insane, but it can't be changed as long as universities refuse to change. So the hard truth is, it's not Springer/IEEE/Nature/etc, it's ultimately, us.

logifail 2y ago
> Publishing in Academia is a scam Relatively soon after starting work on my PhD, one of my more-experienced colleagues explained the affect of "impact factor" on academic publishing. Back then I was young and naive, and assumed that at least impact factor itself would be some kind of open system based on freely-available data. Many years later, I read up on this and discovered Web of Science/Clarivate :( How is it possible that scientists and academics are gated from the most important metrics based on their own output and by which they measure themselves and are measured by those who fund them? It's completely nuts.
- coliveira 2y ago
  My reply is that people want to live in a capitalist country, but don't want to live with the consequences of that. This is one of the consequences.
  - littlestymaar 2y ago
    People want to live in free and democratic countries and in that respect capitalism is the least bad of the totalitarian regimes that exists…
    - coliveira 2y ago
      If you truly believe that capitalism is the best way to "live in free and democratic countries", then you should welcome what Elsevier and others are doing, because that is a direct consequence of their "freedom" to pursue profits.
      - littlestymaar 2y ago
        I never said it's the best, it's actually pretty bad at it (and if you re-read what I've written, you'd see that I consider Capitalism to be a form of totalitarianism). It's just arguably miles ahead of the alternatives that currently exist…
        coliveira 2y ago
        If you truly considered capitalism a form of totalitarianism, you wouldn't be advocating for it, nor suggesting that people who love democracy would be interested in such a system.
        littlestymaar 2y ago
        Maybe you should try understanding the comments you respond to before jumping to conclusions, just saying.
        coliveira 2y ago
        People like you should stop using nonsensical arguments when writing, just saying.
        2y ago
  - thunky 2y ago
    Based on what OP is saying, if capitalism was really working here then Springer would be out of business - because they don't provide any value. It seems what we have here is a cultural problem.
    - ffsm8 2y ago
      Honestly, you have an idealized view on capitalism. It's still the most productive system humanity has ever used at scale, but capitalism favors monopolies, cartels and every other anti-competitive behavior you can think of. That's why we have regulations against such behavior. Even if - as it turns out- these regulations can still be weaponized by bad acteurs to ultimately strengthen their hold on markets
      - Sardtok 2y ago
        He did say "if capitalism was really working". I at least read that as "working as intended", i.e. as the capitalistic ideal.
        ffsm8 2y ago
        Yes, and my point was that the capitalistic ideal does not mean fair competition. Because capitalism inherently favours anti-competitive behavior. If it didn't, we wouldn't have had to pass legislation to outlaw it. Quoting "not real capitalism" as am argument is at the same level as saying "we just didn't try real socialism yet". That's technically true, too. And we likely never will.
    - aspenmayer 2y ago
      In this case, it seems close to a prisoner's dilemma. That would make the researchers the prisoners and Springer the jailer in this analogy. All researchers are incentivized to defect to the jailer(s)/private publishers until they know that there is a critical mass of prisoners willing to make a prison break/switch to open access journals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - smsm42 2y ago
    No it is not. There's nothing in the capitalist model that mandates academic community to maintain a zero-valued-add gatekeepers. It's just an extremely lazy dunk, which happens each time somebody discusses any rent-seeker setup - somebody comes out of the woodwork and proclaims "oh, it's because of capitalism!". In a very very very dumb sense it is - like the reason of crime is that people are breathing. If they didn't they'd be dead, and there were no possibility of them to be criminal. It is this level of lazy and useless logic. Yes, capitalism allows rent-seekers to exist. But it in no way mandates their existence - a model without rent-seekers is as compatible - I would say even more compatible - with capitalism as one with them. Just don't make this kind of lazy dunks anymore, it really adds nothing to the problem.
    - coliveira 2y ago
      To avoid the rent seeking you need a state that will enforce laws that prohibit the rent seeking process and revert it when it has formed. This is not compatible with free market capitalism in abstract (being against the freedom of capitalist agents), and in practice it cannot be done because the capitalists will use political power to stop it.
      - smsm42 2y ago
        It is one pissible solution - just as one possible solution for theft is abolishing private property. If there's no property, nobody could steal anything. But it's not the only solution. There are many other ways - such as not employing the services of rent seekers, for example - that do not require government involvement. In some markets, this solution is blocked - usually by, guess what, goverment regulations - but as far as I can see, no goverment forces academia to elevate Elseveir to its pedestal.
rmbyrro 2y ago
Sounds like a government
teleforce 2y ago
> Publishing in Academia is a scam Using your logic any publishing is a scam including blogging where monetary renumeration does matters [1] > Nowadays everyone puts their papers also on arxiv.org so at least we can read each other's papers for free Do you realize that not everyone can get their paper published in Arxiv, it's a free journal masquerading as a pre-print server? [2] > Of course one has to examine why this system is still in place. Hmm because it does work albeit the imperfections? [1] How Do Bloggers Actually Make Money? https://www.gillianperkins.com/blog/bloggers-actually-make-money https://www.gillianperkins.com/blog/bloggers-actually-make-m... [2] alphaXiv: Open research discussion on top of arXiv: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41485814 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41485814
michaelmior 2y ago
> which happens to add value to nobody but their own pockets. While publishers as they exist now are not necessary for this, the publishing process does typically incorporate peer review which has significant value. I agree that things need to change, but I don't think it's true that zero value is added by publishers.
- thomasahle 2y ago
  In many fields, particularly those that rely on conferences over journals, peer review is organized by others, not the publisher. So here they are truly doing nothing but hosting the papers behind their pay wall.
- fanf2 2y ago
  Peer review is done for free by academics. The publisher does not contribute to peer review.
  - michaelmior 2y ago
    The publisher does often assist with coordinating the peer review process which is a nontrivial task. I'm not saying this in itself necessitates everything else surrounding the publishing ecosystem, but I don't think it's accurate to say the publisher does not contribute.
    - jampekka 2y ago
      In my editor experience the assistance is minimal at best. Editors (almost all upaid) assess suitability of manuscripts, find the reviewers and handle all communication.
- jampekka 2y ago
  Peer review and editing is done free by academics. Publishers "facilitate" this by having horrible unusable sofware platforms from the 90's for this. These are actually worse than nothing, as review would be a lot easier to organize and conduct via e-mail. Publishers don't add value, they subtract it. People probably have hard time undersanding this because the system is so absurd and so obvious racket they don't think such can exist.
the8472 2y ago
Sounds like a coordination problem? Couldn't university departments sign pledges that they'll stop using those journals if N peer institutions in their country do too?
impendia 2y ago
As an academic, I agree with almost everything you say -- but I wouldn't blame policies in universities. As much as I hate all the bureaucracy, I can't blame it here. Academics are periodically called upon to pass judgment on other academics. It's an unsavory part of our job, but given that there are fewer jobs, less grant funding, etc. than the number of strong applications, it's a necessary evil. To the best we can, we try to evaluate their research record directly. But it is maddeningly difficult to evaluate work even slightly out of your field, and so journals serve as a signaling mechanism. And here I agree again with what you say: we are paying millions to Springer, Elsevier, etc. for the use of their names. ("Ooh, this person published in Inventiones Mathematicae!") Which we we made great. As much as I despise this system, if you believe that universities can change this, at the level of policy, I am very curious to hear what you propose.
- g-b-r 2y ago
  Gather together and begin publishing your own journals (even just in the form of a website)? If it's you who made the existing journals great, you probably can do it again?
  - da_chicken 2y ago
    That's just kicking the can down the road.
    - g-b-r 2y ago
      In what way? I meant freely accessible journals, of course (making journals, or "journals", of their own, would probably cost much less than the subscriptions they're currently paying)
  - impendia 2y ago
    This is a coordination problem. There are some efforts in this direction; for example, the researchers who led the Elsevier boycott http://thecostofknowledge.com/ http://thecostofknowledge.com/ started a free open-access journal https://discreteanalysisjournal.com/about https://discreteanalysisjournal.com/about in which I'm proud to have a paper accepted. But it's difficult to dislodge the existing system quickly, even if everyone involved wants to.
RobotToaster 2y ago
Sounds like a form of prisoners' dilemma.
sizzle 2y ago
You forgot Elsevier in your list

by zero_k 2y ago

logifail 2y ago

> Publishing in Academia is a scam Relatively soon after starting work on my PhD, one of my more-experienced colleagues explained the affect of "impact factor" on academic publishing. Back then I was young and naive, and assumed that at least impact factor itself would be some kind of open system based on freely-available data. Many years later, I read up on this and discovered Web of Science/Clarivate :( How is it possible that scientists and academics are gated from the most important metrics based on their own output and by which they measure themselves and are measured by those who fund them? It's completely nuts.

coliveira 2y ago
My reply is that people want to live in a capitalist country, but don't want to live with the consequences of that. This is one of the consequences.
- littlestymaar 2y ago
  People want to live in free and democratic countries and in that respect capitalism is the least bad of the totalitarian regimes that exists…
  - coliveira 2y ago
    If you truly believe that capitalism is the best way to "live in free and democratic countries", then you should welcome what Elsevier and others are doing, because that is a direct consequence of their "freedom" to pursue profits.
    - littlestymaar 2y ago
      I never said it's the best, it's actually pretty bad at it (and if you re-read what I've written, you'd see that I consider Capitalism to be a form of totalitarianism). It's just arguably miles ahead of the alternatives that currently exist…
      - coliveira 2y ago
        If you truly considered capitalism a form of totalitarianism, you wouldn't be advocating for it, nor suggesting that people who love democracy would be interested in such a system.
        littlestymaar 2y ago
        Maybe you should try understanding the comments you respond to before jumping to conclusions, just saying.
        coliveira 2y ago
        People like you should stop using nonsensical arguments when writing, just saying.
        2y ago
- thunky 2y ago
  Based on what OP is saying, if capitalism was really working here then Springer would be out of business - because they don't provide any value. It seems what we have here is a cultural problem.
  - ffsm8 2y ago
    Honestly, you have an idealized view on capitalism. It's still the most productive system humanity has ever used at scale, but capitalism favors monopolies, cartels and every other anti-competitive behavior you can think of. That's why we have regulations against such behavior. Even if - as it turns out- these regulations can still be weaponized by bad acteurs to ultimately strengthen their hold on markets
    - Sardtok 2y ago
      He did say "if capitalism was really working". I at least read that as "working as intended", i.e. as the capitalistic ideal.
      - ffsm8 2y ago
        Yes, and my point was that the capitalistic ideal does not mean fair competition. Because capitalism inherently favours anti-competitive behavior. If it didn't, we wouldn't have had to pass legislation to outlaw it. Quoting "not real capitalism" as am argument is at the same level as saying "we just didn't try real socialism yet". That's technically true, too. And we likely never will.
  - aspenmayer 2y ago
    In this case, it seems close to a prisoner's dilemma. That would make the researchers the prisoners and Springer the jailer in this analogy. All researchers are incentivized to defect to the jailer(s)/private publishers until they know that there is a critical mass of prisoners willing to make a prison break/switch to open access journals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- smsm42 2y ago
  No it is not. There's nothing in the capitalist model that mandates academic community to maintain a zero-valued-add gatekeepers. It's just an extremely lazy dunk, which happens each time somebody discusses any rent-seeker setup - somebody comes out of the woodwork and proclaims "oh, it's because of capitalism!". In a very very very dumb sense it is - like the reason of crime is that people are breathing. If they didn't they'd be dead, and there were no possibility of them to be criminal. It is this level of lazy and useless logic. Yes, capitalism allows rent-seekers to exist. But it in no way mandates their existence - a model without rent-seekers is as compatible - I would say even more compatible - with capitalism as one with them. Just don't make this kind of lazy dunks anymore, it really adds nothing to the problem.
  - coliveira 2y ago
    To avoid the rent seeking you need a state that will enforce laws that prohibit the rent seeking process and revert it when it has formed. This is not compatible with free market capitalism in abstract (being against the freedom of capitalist agents), and in practice it cannot be done because the capitalists will use political power to stop it.
    - smsm42 2y ago
      It is one pissible solution - just as one possible solution for theft is abolishing private property. If there's no property, nobody could steal anything. But it's not the only solution. There are many other ways - such as not employing the services of rent seekers, for example - that do not require government involvement. In some markets, this solution is blocked - usually by, guess what, goverment regulations - but as far as I can see, no goverment forces academia to elevate Elseveir to its pedestal.

rmbyrro 2y ago

Sounds like a government

teleforce 2y ago

> Publishing in Academia is a scam Using your logic any publishing is a scam including blogging where monetary renumeration does matters [1] > Nowadays everyone puts their papers also on arxiv.org so at least we can read each other's papers for free Do you realize that not everyone can get their paper published in Arxiv, it's a free journal masquerading as a pre-print server? [2] > Of course one has to examine why this system is still in place. Hmm because it does work albeit the imperfections? [1] How Do Bloggers Actually Make Money? https://www.gillianperkins.com/blog/bloggers-actually-make-money https://www.gillianperkins.com/blog/bloggers-actually-make-m... [2] alphaXiv: Open research discussion on top of arXiv: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41485814 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41485814

michaelmior 2y ago

> which happens to add value to nobody but their own pockets. While publishers as they exist now are not necessary for this, the publishing process does typically incorporate peer review which has significant value. I agree that things need to change, but I don't think it's true that zero value is added by publishers.

thomasahle 2y ago
In many fields, particularly those that rely on conferences over journals, peer review is organized by others, not the publisher. So here they are truly doing nothing but hosting the papers behind their pay wall.
fanf2 2y ago
Peer review is done for free by academics. The publisher does not contribute to peer review.
- michaelmior 2y ago
  The publisher does often assist with coordinating the peer review process which is a nontrivial task. I'm not saying this in itself necessitates everything else surrounding the publishing ecosystem, but I don't think it's accurate to say the publisher does not contribute.
  - jampekka 2y ago
    In my editor experience the assistance is minimal at best. Editors (almost all upaid) assess suitability of manuscripts, find the reviewers and handle all communication.
jampekka 2y ago
Peer review and editing is done free by academics. Publishers "facilitate" this by having horrible unusable sofware platforms from the 90's for this. These are actually worse than nothing, as review would be a lot easier to organize and conduct via e-mail. Publishers don't add value, they subtract it. People probably have hard time undersanding this because the system is so absurd and so obvious racket they don't think such can exist.

the8472 2y ago

Sounds like a coordination problem? Couldn't university departments sign pledges that they'll stop using those journals if N peer institutions in their country do too?

impendia 2y ago

As an academic, I agree with almost everything you say -- but I wouldn't blame policies in universities. As much as I hate all the bureaucracy, I can't blame it here. Academics are periodically called upon to pass judgment on other academics. It's an unsavory part of our job, but given that there are fewer jobs, less grant funding, etc. than the number of strong applications, it's a necessary evil. To the best we can, we try to evaluate their research record directly. But it is maddeningly difficult to evaluate work even slightly out of your field, and so journals serve as a signaling mechanism. And here I agree again with what you say: we are paying millions to Springer, Elsevier, etc. for the use of their names. ("Ooh, this person published in Inventiones Mathematicae!") Which we we made great. As much as I despise this system, if you believe that universities can change this, at the level of policy, I am very curious to hear what you propose.

g-b-r 2y ago
Gather together and begin publishing your own journals (even just in the form of a website)? If it's you who made the existing journals great, you probably can do it again?
- da_chicken 2y ago
  That's just kicking the can down the road.
  - g-b-r 2y ago
    In what way? I meant freely accessible journals, of course (making journals, or "journals", of their own, would probably cost much less than the subscriptions they're currently paying)
- impendia 2y ago
  This is a coordination problem. There are some efforts in this direction; for example, the researchers who led the Elsevier boycott http://thecostofknowledge.com/ http://thecostofknowledge.com/ started a free open-access journal https://discreteanalysisjournal.com/about https://discreteanalysisjournal.com/about in which I'm proud to have a paper accepted. But it's difficult to dislodge the existing system quickly, even if everyone involved wants to.

RobotToaster 2y ago

Sounds like a form of prisoners' dilemma.

sizzle 2y ago

You forgot Elsevier in your list