Search

Comments on an article in `The American Economic Review' which stated referees are more critical of a scholarly paper when its author's identity is not made known to reviewers and editors are less likely to accept it for publication. Research by Rebecca M. Blank (Northwestern University); Random submission of manuscripts to either double-blind or single-blind review; Results.

The article reports that academic publishers in the U.S. are looking for ways to track mentions or citations of journal articles on social media and other online sources, including a pilot project with British company Altmetric.

The article reports that academic scientists appear to have put their names on papers that are actually ghostwritten by for-profit companies and then published in medical journals. Though most of the scientists accused of doing so deny any wrongdoing, journal editors are already outlining measures to prevent future breaches of academic integrity. A study published in "The Journal of the American Medical Association" shows that many articles published under researchers' names were actually written by employees of pharmaceutical companies.

The article reports on the issues raised on a study published in January 2023 stating that the number of deaths due to the coronavirus vaccines could be as high as 278,000 people. Also cited are the alleged flaws of the study like its inclusion of a survey funded by an anti-vaccine advocate, the possible reaons why it passed through peer review, and the comment by study author Mark Skidmore on his paper, which is already scheduled for retraction.

Reports that religious groups and conservative members of the United States Congress are condemning the American Psychological Association for publishing a paper which states that not all instances of sex between adults and children cause psychological harm to the children. The paper appearing in the July 1998 `Psychological Bulletin'; Paper recommendation that some behaviors now defined as abuse be reclassified as adult-child sex; Comments from the Christian Coalition.

States that a major British medical journal, `BMJ' is testing a new system of peer review using the World-Wide Web. Paper by outspoken advocate of online scholarship which has been publicly posted on the journal's Web site; Editors to decide whether to accept the paper and publish it in the printed version of the journal.

Opinion. Suggests that the reason documentary editions sometimes take so long is because the people who work on documentary editions are, by the nature of their jobs, perfectionists, but primarily because of the temptation to over-annotate, leaving primary materials lost in a sea of information. Appropriate response to this particular danger; Small end runs: Mark Twain's `Angelfish' correspondence from University of Georgia Press; Individual, selective, documentary editions.

Discusses several views on the future of scholarly publishing in an electronic age. Scholarship waiting to be reinvented; The liberating effects of interactive publishing; Maintaining high quality with new tools; Reaching the public as well as scholars; Question of why one press is holding back; Change working its way scholar by scholar; Hedging bets while making grand plans; Tearing up the limits imposed by paper.

Reports that scholars who seek to publish papers that have appeared on line can encounter widely divergent policies among journal publishers. The posting of drafts of articles, sometimes called electronic preprints or e-prints, on Web sites; The reasons some journal publishers do not agree with e-prints; Favorable attitudes toward e-prints gaining the upperhand; A sampling of policies on e-prints. INSETS: A sampling of policies on ``E-Prints';6 leading `E-Print' Services;On-Line archive in political science gains a following.

Discusses findings from autobiographical papers belonging to Alfred and Blanche Knopf, the New York Jewish publishers. The author's quest for information on the cultural history of Jewish entrepreneurs of past; What the papers revealed about the Knopfs and their marriage; The author's observations on the couple after reading the papers.

The article focuses on report findings from the research group, Institute for Higher Education Policy, which show published college rankings vary widely in what they try to measure and how they measure it. The report entitled "College and University Ranking Systems: Global Perspectives and American Challenges" states that most ranking systems in other nations give colleges one overall score. The report consists of three papers including a history of the U.S. News & World Report rankings written by Alvin P. Sanoff, a summary of the major rankings in other countries from Alex Usher and Massimo Savino of the Educational Policy Institute and another paper written by Marguerite Clarke about the formation of higher education.

The article reports that Rice University announced in August 2006 that it will be the first all electronic university press. Rice will produce all academic works in electronic format and post them to a Web site rather than print books on paper. Rice had a traditional university press until the 1990s; the high costs associated with a paper-based press led to its shutting down. The university will use Connexions, its existing open-source online publishing program for the electronic press. Books will be free to read online, but readers will have to pay to download books. Readers can also pay to have a printout of scholarly works printed by a separate print-on-demand company.

This article presents updates related to academic publishing in the U.S. Like elite colleges, top scientific journals often advertise their rejection rates--to show how exclusive they are. But the open-access publisher Public Library of Science is now moving in the opposite direction. PLoS is starting a multidisciplinary journal in August that will publish papers no matter how unimportant their results are. In another news, the peer-reviewed Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine plans next month to retract a 1997 paper that was prepared by corporate consultants but did not acknowledge their contribution.

The article presents a profile of scientific publisher Vitek Tracz and his efforts to alter the process of peer reviews of academic research by designing the open source website Faculty of 1000. It overviews his career as a publisher in the scientific and medical fields through his work with the digital archive PubMed Central, presents concerns from medical and science professionals regarding the inclusion of preprint academic research on Faculty of 1000, and explores Tracz's belief that his approach to open access peer review with allow for more academic transparency and ensure ethical refereeing of papers.

Discusses the changes made on the periodical 'PMLA,' the official journal of the Modern Language Association, as of May 1, 1991. Aim of the editors in introducing the changes; Changes introduced in the review of papers submitted for publication; Reason why other scholars believe that the need to publish articles on unconventional topics made the periodical less readable.

The artcle reports that several academic journals are planning to use anti-plagiarism software on papers submitted by professors. CrossRef, a publishing industry association, is teaming up with software company iParadigms to create CrossCheck, an anti-plagiarism program specifically for academic journals. The software will be better at detecting plagiarism than the manual checks and peer reviewing procedures which are currently employed by most journals. The company hopes 15 publishers will sign on before the product is released.

The article discusses the decision by the American Astronomical Society to not renew its publishing contract with the University of Chicago Press (UCP). The society will instead have its research journals published by the Institute of Physics. The reasoning behind the split is that UCP wanted to renegotiate its agreements and about the format of the journals; the society would prefer to publish its journals on the Internet while UCP is still largely paper-based. The article says that the separation of such a large client from their publisher could have reverberations within the university press industry, which is highly competitive.

The article reports that the Gannett Company bought the "Central Florida Future," the student newspaper at the University of Central Florida, in February 2007. The paper will continue to be written and edited by students and has already had a series of private owners since ending its affiliation with the university in 1993. The purchase marks the second time in six and a half months that a Gannett subsidiary has acquired a student newspaper. At Central Florida, an editorial adviser, one of the newspaper's nine full-time staff members, oversees its content and may intervene if he or she finds an article is biased or otherwise unethical, but students have ultimate control.

The article reports that the Smithsonian Institution has reconstituted its scholarly publishing program in a newly announced partnership with Rowman & Littlefield. The new imprint, known as the Smithsonian Institution Scholarly Press, will be open only to authors who are directly affiliated with the Smithsonian's museums and research units. It is speculated that one possible point of tension has to do with founding secretary Joseph Henry's 150-year-old principle that the Smithsonian's papers should be shared freely with U.S. libraries. Commentary from publisher John Sisk is provided, along with an explanation of how the new program will work.

The article discusses the future of nanotechnology. Scientific publishers see green when they look into the future of nanotechnology. Governments and businesses around the world are pouring some $10-billion into the field each year, and the number of papers in nanoscience is growing exponentially. It rose from just a handful in 1990 to more than 25,000 in 2005. The entry of the company, Nature Publishing Group (NPG) into the nanoscience landscape is attracting particular attention from critics who worry about the proliferation of science journals. The first issue of Nature Nanotechnology will come out in October 2006. According to Jason N. Wilde, publisher for physical sciences at NPG, Nature was known in the early part of the 20th century primarily as a physical-sciences journal. The goal of NPG is to be the world's premier scientific publisher. Nature has begun experimenting with a new form of peer review, in which some reviewers' names would be revealed to authors. Lisa A. Bero, a professor of clinical pharmacy at the University of California at San Francisco says that a well-thought-out online review could be considered in hiring or tenure decisions.

The article reports that a coalition of journal publishers and university libraries in the U.S. is starting an experimental archive of online journals that will be held in reserve in case a journal's publisher goes out of business or is otherwise unable to continue providing online access to its papers. The pilot program uses peer-to-peer archiving software developed at Stanford University, called Lots of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe, or Lockss. The journal archive is called Controlled Lockss, or Clockss.

Presents updates on research publications in the U.S. as of March 11, 2005. Launch of the "Nature Physics" journal; Decision of Blackwell Publishing to allow authors to make their papers available for free to potential readers.

Reports on the recommendations of the U.S. Congress and the British Parliament that papers resulting from government-financed research can be made available free. Pressure made by the Association of American Publishers, a trade group that represents most major book publishers in the U.S., on members of the U.S. Congress to gut the open-access to the results of research; Views of scholars and librarians; Information on the report of the U.S. House Appropriations Committee which revealed that taxpayers have insufficient access to the results of research.

Looks at the struggle of scientific publishers in understanding how U.S. trade embargoes affect them. Decision of the American Chemical Society to end its own temporary moratorium after a ruling by the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) stated that publishers would need special licenses to edit papers submitted by researchers in embargoed countries; Steps taken by other scholarly publishers to deal with the OFAC regulations; Responses of scholarly publishers to the regulations.

Reports on the unveiling of a preprint server on the Elsevier Science ChemWeb site. Opinion that this form of publishing is more efficient, democratic and scholarly than the print-journal system; Concern that papers posted online would then be rejected for print publication; Statement that experts believe that the American Chemical Society should make use of the advantages that preprint servers offer.

Presents news briefs concerning the publication of scholarly books as of February 12, 1999. Review of a book dealing with race in America entitled `By the Color of Our Skin: The Illusion of Integration and the Reality of Race,' by Leonard Steinhorn and Barbara Diggs-Brown; The library of the University of Oregon's receipt of private funding for the establishment of a printing press aimed at publishing limited editions of books made with letterpress printing, fine papers, and unique designs.