Research publishing : where to publish

    What is open access?

• Open access (OA) is a publishing movement aimed at making research freely available online. 
• When research is fully open access, it is free for the public to access, read, download, copy, share, or use for any other lawful purpose. This approach to open access was established in the Budapest Open Access Initiative (2002) and Berlin Declaration (2003).

Open access publishing models

• Gold – articles in fully open journals, in which all articles are published through article processing charges and the entire journal is open to everyone.
• Green – allows self-archiving of, usually the author’s final, peer-reviewed manuscript (pre-print), in a repository such as UOBScholar Hub, though the published article is in a traditional journal that requires a subscription to access.
• Hybrid – authors can choose to pay an APC to make an article available to everyone even though most of the other content in the journal is subscription only and even if the institution pays for a subscription to that journal.

Benefits of Open Access 

• Increasing visibility, impact, and citations -- research audience beyond academic community: maximize author's impact
• Ability to retain copyright of your work so can make it available to reuse and distribute via different routes and avenues. 
• Helps to eliminate inequalities in access to research (developing countries)
• Maximising the potential for collaboration and impact generating activities
• Accelerates the pace of research, discovery and innovation

Institutions may also benefit from an enhanced reputation as their research becomes more visible within the academic community and beyond.

What is predatorypublishers & journals?

The most recent definition of predatory journals and publishers was published in Nature. This definition was agreed upon at the Predatory Summit in Ottawa, Canada, in April 2019.

"Predatory journals and publishers are entities that prioritize self-interest at the expense of scholarship and are characterized by false or misleading information, deviation from best editorial and publication practices, a lack of transparency, and/or the use of aggressive and indiscriminate solicitation practices"

Grudniewicz, et. al. (2019). Predatory journals: no definition, no defence. Nature, 576(7786), 210–212. 

General characteristics of predatory

• Publisher aggressively spams researchers
• Rapid publication is promised
• Author fees hidden or inadequate
• Wants an author processing charge (APC) before acceptance of manuscript.
• Notifying authors of articles fees after papers are accepted
• The journal title is strangely similar to prominent journals in the same field
• The contact email address is non-professional and non-journal related (@gmail.com, @hotmail.com..)
• Manuscripts are requested to be submitted by email instead of through an online submission system
• Missing  ISSN, DOI or Impact Factor
• Implies value by using misleading or fake metrics
• No editor, fake editors, no review board, insufficient number of board members, or same editors for journals of different disciplines
• Falsely claim that their journals are included in academic indexes
• Unprofessional website appearance: contains spelling and grammatical errors, targeted advertisements).
• Publisher has a Negative Reputation (either from inclusion on Beall's List, Cabell's Blacklist Inclusion Criteria, or exclusion from 'top journal' lists). 

Identify quality Open Access journals and avoid predatory publishers 

It is highly recommended that each journal is carefully evaluated before an article is submitted. 
Note that there is no single criterion that indicates whether a publication is reputable. Rather, look for a cumulative effect of more positives or more negatives.

Questions to ask and resources to check:

• Indexed in Scopus 
• Included in Web of Science Master list journals
• Included in Journal Citation Reports (JCR)
• Included in Scimago Journal & Country Rank
• Included in Directory of Open Access Journals DOAJ
• Publisher a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)  or the Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association (OASPA) or Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers (STM)
• Journal listed by SHERPA/RoMEO
• Use the Think, Check, Submit checklist
• Publisher or journal not included in Beall's List – of Potential Predatory Journals and Publishers 
• Journal not included in Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker
• Open Access Journal Quality Indicators, from Grand Valley State University, these guidelines help evaluate open access publications 
• Journal is included in legitimate abstracting or indexing services or databases (MEDLINE, Pubmed Central)
• SPI-Hub - This resource was developed by the Center for Knowledge Management at Vanderbilt University Medical Center to assess publication practices by compiling data from a variety of sources and providing users with both recommendations for publication and assessment of the trustworthiness of journals in which to publish research.

 The campaign helps researchers identify trusted journals for their research via a simple checklist to assess the credentials of a journal or publisher.

Steps for Withdrawing your Work from a Predatory Journal

Once an author has signed a copyright transfer or approves publication of an article in a predatory journal, your chances of having the article removed from the journal are highly unlikely. This is why we stress the importance of avoiding predatory publishers from the start.

In the case that your articles is already published in a predatory journal, you can consider the following options:

• Contact the publisher (by email, phone, and certified letter) and request for the article to be removed from the website.
• Most of the time, authors will not receive a response back from the publisher, even after repeated attempts.
• If you have NOT signed a copyright agreement with the predatory publisher:
• Your article can still be published in a legitimate journal. We recommend contacting the editor-in-chief of the legitimate journal, explain the situation to them and seek their guidance.
• If the paper is accepted in a legitimate journal, it may appear with an editorial note on the paper to explain the situation. 
• Withdrawal of Accepted Manuscript from Predatory Journal
  COPE: Committee on Publication Ethics. Case Number 16-22, 2016.