Introduction For decades, scholarly publishing revolved around a comforting assumption. Content was the asset. Academic journals were the gatekeepers. Libraries paid for access. Prestige flowed through impact factors and brand recognition. The publisher that controlled the journal controlled the market. That logic made sense in a world defined by scarcity. Print runs were finite. Digital … Read more
Introduction For most of its modern history, peer review has been treated as a moment. A paper is submitted, reviewers are assigned, comments are exchanged, and a decision is made. Once published, the work is assumed to have passed a threshold of quality and legitimacy. The system moves on to the next manuscript. That mental … Read more
Introduction Scholarly journal indexing is usually framed as boring infrastructure. A background system. A checklist. A database decision. Something editors deal with quietly while scholars focus on research and writing. That framing is convenient, because it hides just how much power indexing holds over academic life. Being indexed by major databases determines which journals survive … Read more
Introduction Academic publishing is currently undergoing a midlife crisis of some sort. For decades, the traditional model of shipping papers off to a corporate giant, waiting six months for peer review, and then paying to read your own work has been the standard. However, as the internet matured, researchers began to realize that the heavy … Read more
Introduction The publishing industry has been synonymous with major publishing cities: New York and London primarily, with a few other powerful contenders like Toronto and Boston rounding out the usual suspects. If you wanted a serious career in books, magazines, or academic journals, you essentially packed your bags for one of these expensive, notoriously competitive … Read more