1. Should you #DeleteAcademiaEdu? On the role of commercial services in scholarly communication.
Reflecting on the recent surge of criticism about the commercial motives of scholarly social media platform Academia.edu, Paolo Mangiafico, in his post in The Impact Blog, argues this is now an ideal opportunity for scholars to make informed choices about their work. If you are comfortable with the trade-offs and risks, and willing to exchange those for the service provided, then don’t #DeleteAcademiaEdu. But consider whether alternatives exist that will meet your needs while also preserving your ability to keep control of your work.
The blog post says (quote): The challenge with sites like Academia.edu is that this is not possible. By most accounts, Academia.edu is a fine service, and clearly it’s meeting a need, as the number of academics who have profiles in it shows. They are doing very well at motivating academics to put their profile data and publications there. But what happens to that information once it’s there? By my read of the site’s terms of service, no other uses can be made of what you’ve put there - it’s up to Academia.edu to decide what you can and can’t do with the information you’ve given them, and they’re not likely to make it easy for alternative methods of access (why would they?). There doesn’t appear to be a public API, and you need to be logged in to do most of the useful things on the site (even as a casual reader)……….. (unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
2. As PLOS ONE Shrinks, 2015 Impact Factor Expected to Rise
PLOS ONE's 2015 Impact Factor is expected to rise, the result of its shrinking size. As reported earlier this year, the open access mega-journal has experienced two successive declines in article output, from a peak of 31,509 research papers in 2013 to 28,107 in 2015-a reduction of 3,402 papers or 11 percent, notes Phil Davis, in his post in the Scholarly Kitchen Blog.
The blog post says (quote): The Journal Impact Factor is constructed by summing all citations made to papers published in the previous two years and dividing by the number of papers published in those two years. There is a little more nuance to this approach, as the number of papers in the denominator is limited to research articles and reviews - what Thomson Reuters calls “citable items.” Whereas some journals publish many papers that are not considered citable (e.g. editorials, perspectives, commentary, letters, etc.), this is not the case for PLOS ONE. This will help simplify our example of how size affects Impact Factor calculations……….. (unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
3. Why Peer Review Recognition Matters to Universities
A decade ago a discussion on peer review would have been completely out of place at a Research Profiles Conference. There was no way for a research institution to reliably track and verify the peer review activities of their researchers, and nothing visible to profile! But the landscape has changed, and now 50,000+ researchers are using services like Publons to keep a verified record of their peer review contributions, notes Daniel Johnston, co-founder of Publons, in his guest post in the Digital Science Blog.
The blog post says (quote): Including peer review in research profiles opens up the ability to gather insights from peer review - for instance, which journals their researchers are reviewing for, and how their peer reviewing activity compares to other universities - and to include evidence of peer review in promotion applications. The University of Queensland Library recently became the first to begin work on importing peer review data into their research output management system for these purposes. Beyond the value to universities and their peer reviewing researchers, universities taking peer review contributions into account has the potential to improve the performance of the peer review process for everyone………..(unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
4. Advances in peer review
It’s not too hard to see that the practices of and attitudes towards ‘open science’ are evolving amidst an ongoing examination about what the modern scholarly system should look like. While we might be more familiar with the ongoing debate about how to best implement open access to research articles and to the data behind publications, discussions regarding the structure, management, and process of peer review are perhaps more nuanced, but arguably of equal or greater significance, notes Jon Tennant, in his post in the ScienceOpen Blog.
The blog post says (quote): In spite of this clear importance of peer review, there is increasing evidence that mistakes are becoming ever more frequent in the process. These ranges from simple gate-keeping errors based on differences in opinion of the perceived impact of research or the rejection of what then become seminal pieces of research, to fraudulent or incorrect work failing to be detected and entering the permanent scientific record. Attempts to reproduce how peer review filters what becomes published demonstrate that peer review is generally adequate for detecting quality work, but often fails to recognise the most impactful research. Many additionally regard the traditional peer review model as unnecessary as it causes delays to the publication and communication of novel research.……….. (unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
5. Three Brilliant Publishers Doing Things Differently
The publishing industry has encountered plenty of change in the past decade, most acutely due to the consumers’ mass adoption of digital content, which has been widely reported. Accordingly, the old stalwarts have been forced to adapt in a competitive environment, and this has opened up opportunities for smaller, more agile publishing groups to capitalise and find a niche. Unfortunately, some Goliaths have fallen by the wayside, and we’ve seen many complex buy-outs and mergers as a result of the changing market conditions. In his post in the Digital Book World Blog, Matt Goolding meets some innovative publishers to discuss that how they are navigating a successful path through volatile waters.
The blog post says (quote): “The real challenge is not so much publishing within digital formats, but understanding and then implementing how best to commercially exploit the opportunities digital offers. And not just digital formats, but digital channels. There has been plenty of coverage over the last few years of traditional publishers saying that digital is the future, and print under threat, when in truth for the majority of us, ‘digital’ is simply another format to publish in. What interests me is how we can use digital to create a ‘holistic’ reading experience for readers that embraces print, ebook, audio, video. Digital is about choice, and the real fear for me isn’t about digital replacing or destroying print; it’s about missing out on the opportunities digital offers publishers to innovate and grow.” .……….. (unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
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