Independent Thinking on Publishing's Future
Introduction A good abstract decides whether your paper gets read, and AI tools can help you write one faster. This guide covers what a strong abstract contains, how to write each part, and how to use AI for drafting and polishing without giving up your judgment or breaking journal rules. Key points Academic publishing has … 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
Introduction Academic journal publishing has never been easy. But as we settle into 2025, what used to be slow-moving tectonic shifts have turned into a full-blown earthquake. Publishers, editors, and scholarly communication managers are grappling with open access mandates, AI-generated submissions, shrinking funding, and the ghost of predatory publishing. The peer review system groans under … Read more
Introduction From the outside, running a scholarly journal might look like a respectable side gig for seasoned academics—review a few articles, polish some editorial notes, publish a couple of issues a year, and voilà: knowledge is served. Reality, of course, is far messier. Behind every published article lies a network of frantic email chains, delayed … Read more
Introduction Academic journals are famously sluggish. Submitting a paper can feel like tossing it into a black hole, waiting months—sometimes over a year—for a verdict that ranges from “revise and resubmit” to the dreaded “desk rejection.” This pace can be maddening for authors, especially early-career researchers on the tenure clock or those in fast-moving fields. … Read more