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There are ample national, transnational, and international geopolitical conflicts around the world, the two most prominent likely being the current ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war, and the conflict between Taiwan (the Republic of China) and China (the People's Republic of China). To avoid criticism or the label of political bias, academics might refrain from using the term Taiwan or might not refer to it as a country. Similarly, they might not know whether they should refer to Crimea or the Donbas as being Ukrainian or Russian. Authors currently have little guidance and are somewhat left to their own devices when it comes to referring to these and other locations and territories, uncertain of the names that should be used to indicate them. They might also observe disclaimers on publishers' websites, in the footer of editorial board pages, or even as a small notice in their own manuscripts placed there by the publisher that distance the publisher from geopolitical conflicts and/or territorial claims, claiming neutrality, independent of whether those papers mention those conflicts, or not. Such disclaimers might be perceived as self-serving, placing the onus of responsibility of the choice of territorial term on authors' shoulders, so publishers should offer clearer advice to authors and editors on how to better handle this issue, that is, how to accurately name locations in geopolitically sensitive areas. There is a risk that papers that are insufficiently sensitive to such issues may be labelled as erroneous, and subjected to correction or retraction, or the authors may be subjected to public criticism or humiliation, so resolving this issue falls within the realm of academic publishing ethics. Currently, very little advice exists for geopolitical issues in the Committee on Publication Ethics and International Committee of Medical Journal Ethics ethics-related publishing guidelines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chapter 3 first explores the doctoral publication policies and reveals the neoliberal ideologies embedded in scholarly publishing by analysing the institutional documents on doctoral education and publication of a focal university. He argues that doctoral publication is a complex and dynamic activity, so the policies, practices, and doctoral students' dual identities should be viewed in a dialectical manner. [Extracted from the article]

Academic institutions are exploring new mediums for publishing and disseminating research output; in this article, the author is primarily focused on the role of Academic Research Blog (ARB) maintained by universities, departments, or groups of scholars. The author investigated the typical patterns and flaws of the current ARB; the analysis suggests that there is a need, and therefore an opportunity, to upgrade it in a new format, which the author calls the Quality Blog. The Quality Blog is defined by a set of eighteen requirements (policies and characteristics). Some of these requirements are already present in the ARBs, while others are derived from the journal format. The novelty of the Quality Blog format that is proposed consists in applying together all of these eighteen requirements (policies and characteristics), inclusively. The Quality Blog will overcome the limitations that the ARBs have and be a more economically sound decision regarding costs for monograph and journal workflows. The 'Quality' attribute refers to three dimensions: contents, processes, and technology; the practical and operational choices that each Quality Blog will need to make regarding these three quality dimensions will determine the success and sustainability of the project throughout the course of time. In examining the blogs of the top thirty-eight business schools, the author investigates the blogs by cataloging the types of blogs and then the digital platform used. Of these institutions, 90 per cent have created and maintain blogs, and 51 per cent use the ARB powered by a content management system. These results reveal that the Quality Blog would be a new paradigm of research communications to adopt in place of ARB by higher education institutions, research groups, and initiatives interested in promoting academic publishing projects both in science, technology, and mathematics and in humanities and social science subject areas, and re-prioritizes faster, real-time academic communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors assess the current status of scholarly publishing and reach the conclusion that the current situation is both in a state of flux and not sustainable. While such an assessment is becoming increasingly well understood, a solution to the problems seemingly does not exist. What even embodies an improvement to the current state of scholarly publishing depends on one's perspective. The authors approach the problem from the perspective of the main producers and consumers of scholarly knowledge—academic and governmental research institutions. From this perspective, they define a set of objectives for scholarly publishing and dissemination of published works, and they assess the challenges with current approaches to meeting these objectives for commercial publishers, professional organization publishers, and academic press publishers. Based on this analysis, the authors propose a new model for academic publishing that might help achieve the stated objectives. The academic research community alliance model suggested is based on the scholarly community taking on the responsibilities of peer review, article production, and knowledge dissemination while acting in an altruistic way of doing so. The proposed approach is described in detail, and both challenges and potential solutions to the impediments to implementing this model are explored. Finally, the authors report on initial efforts to build support for the proposed model, which suggests that meaningful progress on this difficult problem is possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As scholarly publishing continues to expand its international dimension in the globalizing era, authors in non-Anglophone contexts today are increasingly confronted with the decision to publish nationally or internationally. Linguistic challenges aside, such a decision is complicated by the tension between local interests and international solidarity with changing conventions of scholarly publishing in the national context. This study investigated one facet of this tension by comparing national and international publishing activities in the humanities and social sciences based on the data collected from the websites of sixty Chinese-medium national journals and sixty English-medium international journals. The findings point to a complex interplay between local and international traditions, norms, and politics of knowledge production. What these changes mean and how they may bear on author choice is discussed with implications for understanding the dynamic landscape of scholarly publishing in non-Anglophone systems of knowledge production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What role do networks play during the digital transformation of the scholarly publishing system? This article depicts sociospatial practices and its strategic relevance for stakeholders being involved within the Open Access community. The aim is to explore networks of scholar-led publishing initiatives and to facilitate an extended understanding of the scholarly publishing system in transition by thinking it through with sociospatial theory from a Lefebvrian perspective. As a case study, the Radical Open Access Collective (ROAC) with more than 70 members is explored in a mixed methods research design. The focus of the qualitatively-driven research is the Collective's sociospatial strategies e.g. networking and multiscalar activities. A systematic literature research and interviews with experts in the field of scholar-led publishing provide the main data set, being triangulated with desk-based research on the ROAC. The results show networking processes on three different levels building on a social network analysis. Moreover, this article contributes to a deeper understanding of a network of scholar-led publishers indicating key sociospatial strategies considering dialectics of scalability. Concluding, this study emphasises the importance of sociospatial strategies for non-profit publishing initiatives in order to create a knowledge commons around open and equitable infrastructures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Throughout, Barczak and Griffin emphasize reviewers as educators, advisers, and consultants, noting the coaching dimension that incorporates a developmental, not just critical, approach: "High-quality reviewers guide and teach without condescending" (87). In each chapter, Barczak and Griffin offer between one dozen and two dozen "issues for consideration" couched as questions that reviewers could put to a manuscript under review. [Extracted from the article]

While guides to productivity in scholarly writing often mention what kinds of writing should be prioritized through the scholarly publishing process, less attention has been paid to clearly conceptualizing what strategic approaches to prioritizing writing best meet particular goals. This article turns to the personal finance literature to translate two key strategies—the avalanche and the snowball—from the context of debt repayment to that of scholarly writing. By clearly identifying the strategies, logics, and aims of these two approaches to writing, scholars can more clearly meet specific goals related to their publications. This marks a conceptual contribution to the literature on scholarly writing by introducing a theoretical framework for writing strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a subsequent chapter, Schwartz's definition of run-on sentences misses the mark: "A run-on sentence is simply a sentence that is too long" (266); the three examples that follow are straightforward (though lengthy) compound sentences. I appreciate that Schwartz encourages scholarly writers to think like reviewers, not like editors, since editors of peer-reviewed publications depend on reviewers for 'most of the "heavy lifting" involved in the editorial review process' (314). But if you happen to be in Schwartz's field or, for that matter, in any quantitative empirical field, you should buy this book, engage with this book, and then consider reaching out to Schwartz, who claims never to have declined reasonable requests for his mentorship. [Extracted from the article]

A growing number of PhD scholars graduated from Western universities are returning to China, and this raises a range of research topics for scholars. Previous studies of these returnee scholars have mainly focused on the challenges of publishing in English but have ignored their difficulties in choosing between international and/or local academic communities. Academic publishing is regarded as a social practice in this study. Based on the data collected from 102 Chinese returnee scholars in the humanities and social sciences and drawing on the concept of discourse community, it is found that these volunteers' publication practices are shaped by the culturally specific academic norms established in particular academic communities. This study highlights the differences between international and local discourse communities and identifies factors influencing Chinese returnee scholars' publication practices. The ways in which they seek to exercise agency and strategies for publishing in the international and local academic communities are considered. The complexity of these returnee scholars' publication practices is revealed through their lived experiences, adding depth and detail to current research into returnee scholars across the globe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the gap in gender bias-related publication using the Academy of Management Journal, a top-tier management journal, as a reference point. Specifically, we examine, over time, the difference in publication rates for women, men, and the characteristics of diverse teams of scholars in terms of their publication results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Portwood-Stacer's book is a workbook, and working through it will deliver insights into the roles of book proposals and, perhaps even more importantly, the relationships that undergird scholarly publishing. After all, as any acquisitions editor will tell you, the book contract and the book manuscript, not the book proposal, are what matter more. [Extracted from the article]

The status of published literature can change at any time in its history following publication, although existing structures in academic publishing for recording these changes, despite the existence of a number of robust tools—such as the digital object identifier (DOI)—appear to be insufficiently robust, or used too inconsistently or inefficiently, to deal with multiple corrections. In this article, an information storage method and corrective measure or tool is proposed—the 'publication history'—that considers the full history and background of an article's publication. The 'publication history' is adjusted to record changes to an article over time, and is thus a 'live' document, always open to modification and updating. The 'publication history' has the potential to accommodate, in a single document (in both PDF and HTML format), information about pre-publication (e.g., preprints) and post-publication events, including submission, resubmission, acceptance date, handling editors, peer-review format, corrections, expressions of concern, and retractions. The 'publication history' employs two DOIs, one for the article and one for any and all edits, to document these changes. Our proposal offers one possible solution for fortifying the integrity of peer review and the publication process pre- and post–peer review. The doubl DOI based 'publication history' can be applied to any document. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much has been written to inform academics about revising a dissertation and completing a book, but most of this advice focuses on first-time authors. By contrast, there is little advice directed toward more experienced academic authors that considers the conditions they confront when writing a second book, such as increased demands on them to provide institutional and professional service. Second-time authors may also enjoy the assurance that comes from having established a relationship with a publisher or having achieved tenure. This article offers three lessons about how writing a second book is different from writing the first. It considers how experienced authors' relationships with publishers may change with a second book, and it examines ways to situate a second book in the course of a long academic career. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Greenhouse Studios | Scholarly Communications Design at UConn is a shared venture of the School of Fine Arts, University Library, and College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Connecticut. Greenhouse Studios' core research mission is the development of workflows that bring diverse interdisciplinary teams together to create works of digital and non-traditional scholarship while also cultivating a collaborative work culture. This article summarizes the implementation, assessment, and refinement of those workflows, which together constitute Greenhouse Studios' design-based, inquiry-driven, collaboration-first model of scholarly production. Findings from this research, undertaken with support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, include modifications to Greenhouse Studios' operations, specifically to the terminology used in its design-process model, the composition of team personnel, approaches to project management, tactics to foster divergent thinking, and our relationships to press partners. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is twofold: 1) to analyse common career difficulties experienced by academic journal editors in China and explain their causes; and 2) to identify how stakeholders in Chinese scholarly publishing can support editors. Thirty-two academic journal editors were surveyed, and fourteen of those were subsequently interviewed. We found that a deficit of high-quality manuscripts, a large number of laborious tasks at work, limited opportunities for professional advancement, and low job satisfaction were the main career difficulties, of which the two most common were a deficit of high-quality manuscripts and low job satisfaction. The key causes of these difficulties were an unbalanced academic evaluation system that rewarded indexed over non-indexed journals and the marginal status of journal offices at their affiliated institutions. The forms of support most desired by respondents were recognition for their work, salary increases, greater opportunities for continued learning, easier job title promotion, and more scholarly communication with their peers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is part two of a study drawing on semi-structured interviews with twenty-one academics working in the humanities and social sciences at Australian universities. Part two explores why academics write books, who their target audience is, how they learned about publishing, and how they share their knowledge with others. I use self-determination theory to analyze their motives for publishing books. The interviews revealed that academics publish books primarily to share knowledge with other academics, to build their reputation, and to advance their career. These intrinsic motives (enjoyment and satisfaction) and extrinsic motives (success and reputation) are intertwined, and their relative importance evolves over an academic's career. In the past, authors learned about book publishing primarily from experience, but today there are more formal and informal opportunities to acquire publishing knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing from personal experience revising my dissertation into a book and helping dozens of authors do the same, I put language to a critical yet challenging phase in this process: working on one's book. After describing what working on one's book entails, elucidating how it fundamentally differs in posture from writing a book proposal, and explaining why authors might abandon this work prematurely in favour of more familiar modes of working, I offer actionable prompts and exercises that authors can use to make working on their book more concrete. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is part one of a two-part study on the publishing behaviours of academics in the humanities and social sciences (HSS) at Australian universities. Our data consist of semi-structured interviews with twenty-one participants. Part one explores how current institutional pressures and the research funding environment are shaping academics' book publishing practices. In particular, we attend to the growing concerns of academics relating to the measurement and ranking of universities, which are driving performance expectations for publishing, and we examine how this trend is influenced by changes in governmental policy and the requirements of funding bodies. We found that Australian HSS academics face increasing pressure to publish journal articles rather than books, to publish books with prestigious international publishers, and to secure external funding for their research. These pressures could restrict their scholarly autonomy or even influence their research agenda. We contend that these developments have concerning implications for HSS in Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we analyse a relatively recent commercial strategy used by large academic publishers to capitalize on the brand names of their most prestigious scientific journals. Using Pierre Bourdieu's model of capital conversion, we explain how publishers transfer the symbolic capital of an already prestigious journal to derivative journals that share in the prestige of the original brand and transform it into new economic capital. As shown by their high impact factors, these newly created journals benefit from the name recognition and reputation of the originals after which they are named. Plus, through a manuscript routing mechanism, the publishers recycle some of the submissions rejected by their highly selective flagship journal by redirecting those manuscripts, along with their reviews, to derivative journals or to one of the lower-impact journals on their list, which may require an article processing charge for publication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes actions recently taken by the government, scholarly publishers, and researchers to face the COVID-19 challenge in China. By promulgating new policies and funding new programs, the Chinese government at all levels has provided huge support for research on COVID-19. Guided by the new policies, Chinese scholarly book publishers have published 124 new titles on the subject of the coronavirus. Journal publishers have put out numerous calls for papers and launched open access platforms for COVID-19 research. Chinese researchers have produced 2021 English-language papers and 2837 Chinese papers on COVID-19. These activities have the potential to affect scholarly publishing in China and around the world in multiple ways: 1) by establishing a more reasonable academic evaluation system in China; 2) by bringing about a more balanced relationship between Chinese scholarly publishers' profit motive and their commitment to social welfare; and 3) by altering the communication channels that Chinese researchers use and the publishing choices they make. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this brief article, the author speculates on the possible negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on scholarship and scholarly output for academics who may already experience discrimination in the workplace. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholarly journals, the electronic posting platform arXiv, and the open-access publishing platform F1000Research are three paper publishing systems currently available to researchers. These three systems all have their shortcomings. We introduce another option, a Paper Online Rating Platform (PORP), where all submissions are rated and none rejected. PORP has obvious advantages, we argue, over the other three paper publishing systems. We define PORP, describe its advantages, and discuss some challenges for its future development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines why Nigerian academics are patronizing predatory publishers and the implications of this for scholarly communication in Nigeria. The study pursued a qualitative method of face-to-face interviews to collect data from twenty-five academics from five universities in South West Nigeria. Five research questions guided the collection and analysis of data. The results confirmed that Nigerian academics are patronizing predatory journals. These journals are characterized by rapid publication, article-processing fees, a lack of peer review, and aggressive advertisement that cajoles authors into publishing with them. The reasons why Nigerian academics patronize predatory journals include desperation at the thought of missing out on promotion, long waits for reviews from reputable journals, deficient information literacy, and inadequate knowledge of the journals in their specific subject area. The findings also confirmed that younger, newly recruited, and inexperienced Nigerian academics are those most likely to patronize predatory journals. The implications of this practice are that Nigerian academics will concentrate less on conducting quality research and that researchers elsewhere in the world will lose trust in the ability of Nigerian academics to conduct quality research. The study ends with recommendations for ameliorating the situation: measures such as putting a solid orientation and mentorship program in place for younger academics, formulating institutional policies for scholarly publication, and creating standard accredited lists of journals that restrict where Nigerian academics can publish. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholarly writing is an expectation for faculty at many universities because this writing is intended to advance knowledge and innovation. However, many professionally focused teaching universities do not have minimal faculty requirements for scholarly publication. This is a problem because faculty at these universities can contribute to the literature with research on teaching and on the practical application of theory. As faculty at a professionally focused teaching university that does not have a "publish or perish" policy, we desired to contribute scholarly writing beyond the university's expectations. This contribution became increasingly difficult to make on account of the fast-paced, innovative nature of our institution. Given this context, we formed a multi-disciplinary Intellectual Community of Practice, which we define as a group of intellectual practitioners who share a common goal, concern, or passion for learning through organized regular interactions. The goal of our group was to provide peer support for writing individually in our respective fields. In this article, we describe how we formed our group, how the group developed over time, and what positive outcomes have resulted from our interactions. We conclude the article with reflections on the process and recommendations to others for how to form an Intellectual Community of Practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is twofold: a) to analyse the current situation of Chinese academic book exports from a publisher's perspective, including models, channels, motivation, and performance; b) to identify the challenges that Chinese scholarly publishers are facing and explain their causes. In all, fifteen publishers from state presses, local presses, and university presses were interviewed. Desk research supplemented the interview data. We found that co-publishing, copyright transfer, and physical book export are the main models and that publishers prefer co-publishing and copyright transfer to exporting actual books. Book fairs and copyright agents are still important channels for negotiating export deals. Applying for funding programs and achieving evaluative benchmarks are the principal motivators for publishers. Surprisingly, over half the publishers interviewed do not profit much from exportation. Nevertheless, supervising departments and chief managers still attach much importance to it. At present, Chinese scholarly publishers are confronted with the challenges of a quality gap, state subsidy substituting for a real market, and information asymmetry. Unreasonable systems of academic evaluation and quality control, state-owned property rights, limited qualified manpower, and rare cooperation are key causes of these challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

JSP was founded fifty years ago from the vision of Marsh Jeanneret and the pragmatism of Eleanor Harman, director and assistant director, respectively, of the University of Toronto Press. It was conceived in a golden age of scholarly publishing as a journal primarily of practical advice, for authors as well as publishers, presented in an elegant design. Rigorous research into its subject had not yet begun. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Publishers of academic books in Australia have evolved in response to the crisis in scholarly publishing by adapting to the opportunities afforded by digital technologies for faster, cheaper, and more dynamic publishing approaches. Academic authors are at the core of the scholarly publishing landscape, so publishers need to understand their motives and needs. This paper examines data from a survey of academic authors in the humanities and social sciences (HSS) in Australia. Our aim for the survey was to understand the publishing experiences, behaviours, and perceptions of these authors. We discovered their expectations for publishers are high. They want fast turnaround, high-quality editing and production values, and cheaper books, which run up against three principal constraints for all scholarly publishers: quality, time, and cost. The prestige and reputation of a publisher are critical, and authors are primarily interested in traditional success measures of academic performance. Societal impact or engagement with research end-users was seen as less important. The findings of this project highlight a number of contradictions and tensions within the scholarly publishing landscape, and they have tangible implications for practices in HSS for authors and publishers, as well as for grant funders and university administrators who adopt policies and assign criteria for research evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a prevalent myth, even in scholarly literature, that peer review was born, fully formed, with the advent of the first scientific journals in the seventeenth century. Recent work has shown this to be false. Many of the practices we call peer review are much newer—as new as the second half of the twentieth century. Some essential elements of peer review, however, are much older than the seventeenth century—a fact that has been neglected, both by those who have propagated the myth and also by those who have more recently sought to dispel it. This paper provides three examples of scholarly review from history. The first is an example of editorial review in ancient Rome. The second is an example of post-publication peer review involving scholia, beginning in the fourth century. The third is an example of pre-publication review by censors in the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries. I join with those authors who seek to bust the myth about the origins of scholarly review but do so by extending their work in the opposite direction chronologically. What we now give the name peer review is really a group of things that has evolved over time. If we want to learn from the history of scholarly review, then we should take a broader and longer view. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The first issue of Scholarly Publishing came out in October 1969. Now, in October 2019, the Journal of Scholarly Publishing celebrates fifty years of quarterly publication by the University of Toronto Press. To mark the journal's golden anniversary, this compilation features reminiscences written by contributors to JSP, covers from its back issues, and lists of its past editors and its twenty most-cited articles from 2004 to 2019. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enhanced publication features that extend information access, add variety to presentation formats, and improve reader comprehension have become a part of China's academic journals in science and technology (sci-tech for short) in recent years. We sought to determine the degree of their adoption. By surveying 472 Chinese sci-tech journals, we found that 102 of these journals had enhanced publication features. Thus less than a quarter of Chinese sci-tech journals in our sample had adopted enhanced publication at the time of our survey. Moreover, the enhancing features of the 102 journals were mostly simple ones, which did not depend on authors providing supplemental content. More of these 102 journals are published by scholarly associations than by other types of publishers, and the disciplinary distribution of the journals was imbalanced, with the discipline of medicine and health having the lowest percentage of journals with enhanced features among those disciplines with such journals. This finding is out of step with large international publishers, whose medical journals frequently have features of enhanced publication. These results reveal a gap between the practices of large international publishers and those of China's publishers when it comes to adopting enhanced publishing features for sci-tech journals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

University presses publish works of scholarly, intellectual, or creative merit tailored to an audience of specialists or a group with a shared interest. They also connect their host institution to local and regional communities and generate positive publicity for the institution. In recent years, however, university presses have faced increased scrutiny for myriad financial reasons. The purpose of this study was to measure the extrinsic and intrinsic value of one university press by gathering multiple sources of data on productivity, academic reach, and peer comparisons. Additionally, many of the press's recently published authors completed an anonymous online survey about their experiences, preferences, and satisfaction with aspects of the publishing process. Despite the press's recent financial struggles, the results of this study showed evidence of the press's benefits and value, and authors who responded to the survey reported high rates of satisfaction, personal and scholarly growth, and positive outcomes from their publishing experience. The methods of data gathering undertaken for this study may be instructive for others contemplating a similar evaluation of their press's value. Specifically, the survey described herein aimed to measure the value of the press in the view of one of its primary stakeholders — its authors — and similarly designed surveys could measure the value of the press in the view of other important stakeholders. Important implications for the press's practices and future avenues of research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several major problems with peer review exist in the related humanities disciplines of rhetoric, communication, and composition studies: a preponderance of incompetent reviewers, a lack of constructive criticism and the maintenance of orthodoxy, relative ease in identifying blinded authors, editorial passivity, and long waits to receive reviews. We propose five solutions: training for reviewers and editors, reviewers signing their reviews, payment for reviewers, thirty-day review turnaround, and guidelines for reviewing promoted by collective action. Before such solutions could be implemented, however, the existing problems must be acknowledged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise of library-based digital scholarly publishing creates new opportunities to meet scholars' evolving publishing needs. This article presents findings from a national survey of humanities scholars on their attitudes toward digital publishing, the diversification of scholarly products, changing perceptions of authorship, and the desire to reach new audiences. Based on survey findings, the authors offer recommendations for how library publishers can make unique contributions to the scholarly publishing ecosystem and support the advancement of digital scholarship in the humanities by accommodating and sustaining more diverse products of digital scholarship, supporting new modes of authorship, and helping scholars reach broader audiences through interdisciplinary and open access publishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 25 August 2016, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sued OMICS Group Inc., iMedPub LLC, Conference Series LLC, and Srinubabu Gedela, all affiliated with open access mega-publisher OMICS International, for deception in their solicitation of journal articles and advertising of conferences. The ongoing lawsuit seeks to stop OMICS's deceptive practices and disgorge US $50.5 million in ill-gotten gains. OMICS has in turn claimed over $2.1 billion for harm caused by the lawsuit to its business and employees. This article describes the main arguments, counter-arguments, and court decisions in the 5920 pages of pleadings, exhibits, and orders that have been filed through 14 October 2018. The article then evaluates the case to formulate key take-aways for publishers, editors, academics, and universities. Depending on its ultimate outcome, the case against OMICS may be a turning point in the practices of questionable open access online publishers, making this interim case assessment pertinent to all concerned about the future of academic publishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For this study, we searched academic journal databases and journal lists from China, Japan, and Korea, dating up to July 2018, to determine the percentage of domestic journals published in English in these three East Asian countries. This study differs from most previous studies that relied on article indexes and abstracts for determining the language of academic journals. We took advantage of the full-text searching capabilities that online journal archives allow. We found that journals labelled 'English-Japanese mixed' or 'Korean and English' typically have only English metadata and not English articles and that the vast majority of domestic journals in China, Japan, and Korea are still published in the national language with no English full text. Due to China's fast development and its low percentage of English journals, the world may experience, for the first time in nearly a century, a decrease in the worldwide percentage of active academic journals published in the English language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This dually authored first-person essay offers a narrative account of the far-ranging writing experiences of two well-established academics who, like many others working in higher education, contribute writing to mainstream publications as well as to scholarly ones. The essay considers the implications for professional and personal reputations when material targeted at one kind of audience is easily accessible by another through internet 'context collapse.' It argues for an inextricable connection between authorial ethics and the essential rigour of all good writing, and it encourages scholar-writers to invest their energies in non-scholarly writing for its value to society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When looking for journals to acquire, publishers will find many specialized academic journals that are managed outside university presses. Some are run by individual editorial offices, others by associations, and some under other arrangements. While these journals may not have large circulation numbers, they often have a faithful readership. Understanding the differences between the way a journal was managed in the past and the way a university press can manage it going forward will help the parties involved—publishers and editors—make an orderly transition through acquisition. A press planning to acquire a small, specialized journal should set at least four goals that will enable the journal to gain greater stability and prestige: 1) modifying or even overhauling the existing budget to improve its financial health, 2) amplifying its scholarly reputation, 3) designing it appropriately, and 4) marketing it more widely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Greenhouse Studios | Scholarly Communications Design at UConn is a shared venture of the School of Fine Arts, UConn Library, and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Connecticut. Backed by long-term university investments of staff and space, Greenhouse Studios aims to institute on its university's campus, and share with others involved in academic publishing, a workflow and work culture suited to the creation of multimodal scholarly communications. This article summarizes the research, undertaken with support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, that informed the development of a design-based, inquiry-driven, collaboration-first model of scholarly production that places continuous, close, and equitable scholarly communications labour at the heart of its mission. The model draws together divided workflows and flattens counter-productive hierarchies that, as vestiges of print-only traditions, impede fuller realization of the possibilities offered by the diverse range of digital and hybrid forms that increasingly define the publishing landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A thriving black-market economy of scam scholarly publishing, typically referred to as 'predatory publishing,' threatens the quality of scientific literature globally. The scammers publish research with minimal or no peer review and are motivated by article processing charges and not the advancement of scholarship. Authors involved in this scam are either duped or willingly taking advantage of the low rejection rates and quick publication process. Geographic analysis of the origin of predatory journal articles indicates that they predominantly come from developing countries. Consequently, most universities in developing countries operate blacklists of deceptive journals to deter faculty from submitting to predatory publishers. The present article discusses blacklisting and, conversely, whitelisting of legitimate journals as options of deterrence. Specifically, the article provides a critical evaluation of the two approaches by explaining how they work and comparing their pros and cons to inform a decision about which is the better deterrent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims for a better understanding of the perspectives of contributors to Spanish academic journals regarding open access, open peer review, and altmetrics. Specifically, it explores how age, gender, years of professional experience, and perception and use of social media influence authors' opinions of these developments in scholarly publishing. A sample of 295 contributors to Spanish academic journals participated in a survey about the aforementioned topics. They were found to hold a favourable opinion of open access but were more cautious about open peer review and altmetrics. The responses of younger and female scholars indicated more reluctance to accept open peer review practices. A positive attitude toward social networks did not necessarily translate into enthusiasm for emerging trends in scholarly publishing. Despite this, ResearchGate users were more aware of altmetrics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Journal Impact Factors (JIFs) appear to increase for the majority of scientific journals. The current analysis was initiated to better define the dynamics of JIFs. Original data from the Journal Citation Reports, from 1997 to 2016, were analysed. The number of citations referring to publications of the previous two years was correlated with the number of articles and the increase in the number of articles. A model was calculated by smoothing the correlation curves. The mean JIF increased from 1.1 to 2.2 almost continuously. The model suggested that the mean JIF will asymptotically reach a maximum value of 2.6. The number of publications has been growing annually by a factor of 1.048. Correlating the overall number of countable citations with the number of published articles revealed a stable relationship of 6.3 citations referring to the previous two years. Validation of the model with a sample of forty-nine journals that have been published since 1961 showed that their recent JIF dynamics are well reflected in the data, but extrapolation of the current dynamics did not reflect the JIFs of these journals in the past. Average JIF is likely to reach a plateau in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this essay the author considers the purpose and value of post-publication reviews of scholarly books from the standpoint of a journal editor who publishes them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whereas book reviews in mainstream media outlets reach huge audiences, and their effects are obvious, the effects of reviews in scholarly outlets—and therefore the reason publishers do the work to land them—are harder to quantify. Yet scholarly book reviews play an important role in the long-term perception of a scholarly work and in the larger ecology of scholarship. This essay explains a bit about how scholarly book reviews work and why publishers believe they are valuable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For this special section of the Journal of Scholarly Publishing on the theme of post-publication review of scholarly books, guest co-editor Steven E. Gump took the lead in inviting contributors and offering feedback on their contributions. In his introduction to the special section, Gump draws the contributions together in conversation and presents some of his own views on book reviewing. The co-editors thank him for bringing in a rounded set of perspectives on reviewing to a journal that regularly publishes book reviews but less often reflects on their value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some governments around the world support researchers with financial bonuses for scholarly publications to encourage their productivity. This convergent parallel mixed-methods study investigated whether the ex post funding policy in Turkey, instituted in late 2015, has influenced the quantity and quality of scholarly publications, and whether it has affected the quality of faculty instructional services as measured by student satisfaction. In addition, the study examined whether the financial support provided as a source of motivation has led to any ethical problems. The results indicate that while the ex post funding system has helped increase the number of articles published in journals indexed in national databases, it seems to have resulted in a decrease in those published in international journals indexed by the Web of Science. The results also indicate that the practice of ex post funding seems to have led to an ethical problem in the renaming of Turkish academic congresses. Finally, the policy appears to have negatively affected student satisfaction with the services offered to them by faculty at state universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the spread of open access publishing for technical and scientific papers has improved some long-standing problems in the scientific publishing pipeline, it has worsened others. Meanwhile, peer review and the scientific publication system in general have come under increasingly intense criticism, provoking many reform ideas. Despite the strident language of reformists and the widespread opinion that the situation is worsening, reform ideas have generally received a lukewarm response among researchers. I argue that this complacency is a reaction to reforms that ignore the priorities of readers and how readers' needs have shaped the publishing world today. I outline a path for improving the peer-review system through the use of permanent review boards—to accommodate the needs of readers, reviewers, and authors alike—and show how to get from where we are now to where we should be. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]