Independent Thinking on Publishing's Future
Introduction Before the term “predatory journal” was a staple of every academic editor’s vocabulary, before university librarians whispered warnings about shady publishers charging authors for fake peer review, there was Jeffrey Beall. A quiet academic librarian from the University of Colorado Denver, Beall launched a blog that would shake the foundations of scholarly publishing. It … Read more
Introduction Springer Nature and the Big Ten Academic Alliance (BTAA) announced a landmark agreement: an unlimited open access publishing deal that enables researchers from BTAA institutions to publish an unlimited number of open access articles in Springer Nature journals. This arrangement is a significant shift in the evolving landscape of academic publishing. But what does … Read more
Introduction Academic publishing is a multi-billion-dollar industry—valued at almost $30 billion globally—propped up by a curious economic paradox: the majority of its labor force works for free. Peer reviewers, editors, and even authors provide their services without direct compensation, supporting publishing conglomerates that report profit margins rivaling those of tech giants. How did this industry, … Read more
Introduction Academic publishing makes a great deal of money, but very little of it reaches the researchers, reviewers and libraries who make the system work. This article follows the money to see who gains, who pays and why the model has been so hard to change. Key points Academic publishing is not a sleepy, dusty … Read more
Introduction Overlay journals peer review papers that already sit in open repositories such as arXiv, instead of hosting the articles themselves. That separation makes them cheap to run and free to read and publish in, but it also leaves them short of prestige, indexing and long-term funding. Key points What are overlay journals? Overlay journals … Read more