Open Access - Page 2 of 6 - Predatory Journals and Conferences #OpenAccess

There has been a lot of discussion recently about whether MDPI is a predatory publisher. Indeed, this discussion has been going on for many years dating back to when Jeffrey Beall added this publisher to his list. But, the recent discussion was reignited (in our view) by MDPI being added to another list, which prompted MDPI to respond via their web site. In this article we look at some of the recent discussion that has been going on, as well as some previous papers/articles, and also suggest a way how this discussions can be taken forward so that it gets advanced towards, we hope resolution. Our suggestion includes a way that enable the discussion to take place in an environment where everybody views can be expressed and are subject to independent peer review. Predatory-Reports.com On the 23 Feb 2023 (and updated on 12 Apr 2023), Predatory Reports added all of the journals published by MDPI to their list of predatory journals. At the time of writing (29 Apr 2023), MDPI’s portfolio of journals comprises 426 journals. The reasons given for taking this course of action were outlined in a number of blog posts they had made (in addition to the one listing all the journals that had been added to their list). These posts were: Is MDPI a predatory publisher? (9 Apr 2022) MDPI Self-Citation Problem (6 Jul 2022) MDPI Peer Review Problem (20 Feb 2023) As a side note, we question the dates on these articles, For example the 9 Apr 2022 articles refers to data (the number of journals published by MDPI) in Apr 2023 so we suspect that the year may be wrong? When reading these articles, what struck us was the amount of data in them, particularly the one dated 9 Apr 2022. There has obviously been quite a bit of research in producing all the facts/figures that were presented. We have more to say about this later. MDPI’s Response In response to all their journals being added to Predatory Reports list MDPI issued a statement (14 Mar 2023). The response opens with “Scholars have reported a suspicious website (predatoryreports.org) that has made false claims against the legitimacy of MDPI journals. The anonymous website in question lacks transparency and rigor in its evaluation criteria, and has an apparent bias against MDPI and open access publishing”. This leaves little doubt as to their view on being added to Predatory Reports list of predatory journals. The full response is worth a read, especially if you read the Predatory Reports articles, so that you get a view from both sides. Our Tweets After seeing the Predatory Reports had classified all of MDPI journals as predatory, we decided to take a look at MDPI. Our first tweet made it clear that we were not accusing MDPI of being predatory (or not) as we like to present our own evidence and then, even if we don’t/can't decide, to let others make an informed decision. Following that first tweet, we have made a series of other tweets that (we hope) presents factual information. At the moment, for us, the jury is still out whether MDPI is predatory or not. Actually, there is likely to be a grey area where there is what some would call predatory type behaviour and there are also some excellent examples of good practise - but we are still not in a position to make even that call. Paolo Crosetto Another resource we have seen is an article by Paolo Crosetto. This article was written in 2021, but is still very relevant to the ongoing discussion. Paolo uses the term “aggressive rent extraction” to classify the way MDPI does business, adding that there are elements of predatory behavior and he predicts over time that they are more likely to move in that direction. Paolo’s article is definitely worth a read. Special Issues One of the issues (sic) that Paolo draws out is the explosion of special issues, what has led to the significant increase in published articles over the past few years. This is also mentioned in a Science article, which suggests that one of the reasons MDPI journals have been delisted from Clarivate Web of Science is (in part) due to the number of special issues that they publish. We have also commented on MDPI special issues, but viewed through a different lens. For example, we found one special issue that had only one paper (our tweet was made on 28 April 2023 and as at 17 May 2023, still only one paper had been published) where the three editors were authors. We note that the special issue is still open, so (we assume) that more papers will be published. However, we raised two questions. Why is a paper written by the three editors the first paper that is published in the special issue? It could be argued that they knew that they were going to edit the special issue, so they had it ready but, personally, we think we would have delayed the paper until a few others had been published, otherwise it leads to the type of discussion we are having here. If they were editors of the special issue, how was the reviewing of this paper carried out. We assume that the three authors did not review/handle the paper, but how was it done? Journal citation reports and the definition of a predatory journal: The case of the Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI) Later in this article, we suggest that critiques of publishers should be done in such as way that it is subject to peer review. In fact, this has already been done for MDPI. The story is outlined in this Retraction Watch report (and in our tweet) but essentially a paper was published (https://doi.org/10.1093/reseval/rvab020) that said MDPI exhibited predatory behavior. The journal received an Expression of Concern" which led to the article being retracted and replaced with a revised version. You can read about the changes that were made to the article at the Retraction Watch report. We do not believe that the original version of the paper is available any more, which is a shame as normally, in our experience, a retracted article remains as part of the scientific archive and the revised paper would be a new entry in the archive. This would have allowed the interested reader to compare the "before" and "after". It is not known who raised the Expression of Concern. Delisting of journals Recently, MDPI had two of its journals delisted from Clarivate's Web of Science, which is regarded (along with Scopus) as where you want your journal to be indexed. One of the journals delisted was its flagship journal (International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health). We have commented on this delisting in a previous post, which asks whether a significant number of articles that MDPI publishes is the reason why two of its journals were delisted. Way Forward The articles by Predatory Reports, Paolo, our tweets and our articles (like this one) all have to be treated with caution, for two reasons. Predatory Reports and our Twitter account/web site are anonymous. Speaking (only) for us, we prefer to remain anonymous at the moment as we are aware of the issues that Jeffrey Beall faced when he published his list. We do not wish to suffer the way he did, although there are arguments that he could have been more transparent and robust in the way he added journals/publishers to his list.We are also aware of the arguments/feelings that we should be more transparent and let everybody know who is behind our Twitter account and web site but we realise that we only have one shot at this. Paolo, for which we salute him for, does not hide behind this cloak of secrecy. We wonder if this, in any way, has harmed, or helped his career? The main reason though, why blog posts, web sites, Twitter accounts etc. have to be treated with caution is because they are not subject to external validation or, what we would normally term, peer review.In a recent paper [http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12109-022-09913-1] it was suggested that there should be a peer review process for publishers. That is, an evidence base is presented and this can lead to a conclusion (or not) whether a given publisher is predatory. Importantly, the evidence/conclusions must be subject to peer review. Doing this opens up the scientific process to the issue that we are trying to address. That is, any decision whether a journal/publisher is predatory is subject to peer review, so it is not just a single person making that decision. It also enables the journal/publisher the right of reply either through the original journal (if the authors contacted the journal/publisher) or through a response paper which, again, would be subject to peer review. If it is not possible to publish a peer reviewed paper, and we recognise that many journals/publishers may be reluctant to publish such papers, then evidence should be drawn from the peer review literature or from sources where the data that is used is archived and available. That is, a view on a given publisher should not be based on an opinion. Anything that is presented must be backed up by evidence, which others can access and validate; should that be necessary. Conclusion We would encourage those who have carried out research into MDPI (or indeed other publishers), assuming they believe that their evidence is strong enough, to consider putting their evidence out for peer review. We don’t say this lightly. It will be a lot of work, the authors will have to reveal their identities and the editors/reviewers of the journal they select to submit to may not agree with the evidence that is presented. But, at least, it will follow the scientific process that we all rely on for every other paper that we write or, at least, any paper that we write that we want to be taken seriously. Having said that, an analysis of MDPI has been published, which does conclude that it exhibits predatory behavior. If you are considering submitting to an MDPI journal, due diligence should be carried out (which should be done for any journals you are considering submitting to) and should include reading this paper, which is the best resource we have at the present time.