Dear Jacob, Your posting reminds me of a Research Information Network Conference I went to in 2006 in London. Your views coincide with a presenter there, Peter Mika. His talk can be found at:- http://www.rin.ac.uk/news/events/data-webs-new-visions-research-data-web In his talk he referred to:- openacademia.org Peter Mika and I were on the Closing Panel; he advocated that refereeing is an imposition on a researcher's individual freedom and thus he/she should 'publish' their work on their own website. By contrast, I argued in favour of Journals and peer review, both with respect to my articles and my experiences as an Editor of more than one Journal.
I would be happy to continue corresponding on this not least as publication should be a varied spectrum of options. Also I feel obliged to say that one cannot apply simply, by rote, 'Learned Society publisher is good', 'commercial publisher is bad'; there are exceptions in both camps. [in effect this was the tone of my last posting.] Greetings, John On Wed, Nov 17, 2010 at 8:13 PM, Jacob Keller <j-kell...@fsm.northwestern.edu> wrote: > I guess the practice of being "on your best behavior" is good in terms > of getting the research trimmed into shape, but there is a huge > temptation to fudge things to get published, and to hide unpleasant > artifacts, as can be seen by the many recent (and not so recent) > scandals. Maybe as a lab website things would be more open. Also, > having a comments section always seemed like an excellent idea to me, > even for journals as they are, but would be really easy to implement > in a website. I would love to read comments from others in the field > about the papers I read, as sometimes people can help to point out > gaping holes where one might not see them otherwise. It would be like > "journal club" for the whole scientific community. > > Jacob > > On Wed, Nov 17, 2010 at 2:08 PM, Jrh <jrhelliw...@gmail.com> wrote: >> Dear Jacob >> Re journals out of the window:- >> Well, like democracy, journals may not be ideal but I believe other >> alternatives such as free for all personal website publishing, are worse. >> So, journals that are community driven offer an optimal approach, critically >> based on specialist peer review. That is why our community effort IUCr >> Journals I believe are so important. Open access, where we can sustain it >> financially, also can convey access to the widest readership ie that the >> high impact magazines currently, mainly, command. >> All best wishes, >> John >> Prof John R Helliwell DSc >> >> >> On 17 Nov 2010, at 18:28, Jacob Keller <j-kell...@fsm.northwestern.edu> >> wrote: >> >>> Supplementary info seems to me to be a double-edged sword--I just read >>> a Nature article that had 45 pages of supplementary info. This means >>> that you get a lot more for your money, but all of the methods and >>> >>> Why not have papers be as long as the authors want, now that almost >>> everything is internet-based? It would make the papers much more >>> organized overall, and would obviate the reference issue mentioned in >>> this thread. To avoid them being too too long, reviewers could object >>> to long-windedness etc. But, it would definitely make for a more >>> complete "lab notebook of the scientific community," assuming that >>> that is what we are after. >>> >>> Incidentally, I have been curious in the past why journals are not >>> going out the window themselves--why not have individual labs just >>> post their most recent data and interpretations on their own websites, >>> with a comments section perhaps? (I know there are about a thousand >>> cynical reasons why not...) One could even have a place for >>> "reliability rating" or "impact rating" on each new chunk of data. >>> Anyway, it would be much more like a real-time, public lab notebook, >>> and would make interaction much faster, and cut out the publishing >>> middlemen. >>> >>> JPK >>> >>> On Wed, Nov 17, 2010 at 11:48 AM, Phoebe Rice <pr...@uchicago.edu> wrote: >>>> Another unfortunate aspect of this sort of editorial policy is that many >>>> of these papers contain almost no technical information at all, except for >>>> the supplement. I've started to avoid using Nature papers for class >>>> discussions becuase they leave the students so puzzled, and with a >>>> glossiness-is-all-that-matters idea of science. >>>> >>>> >>>> ===================================== >>>> Phoebe A. Rice >>>> Dept. of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology >>>> The University of Chicago >>>> phone 773 834 1723 >>>> http://bmb.bsd.uchicago.edu/Faculty_and_Research/01_Faculty/01_Faculty_Alphabetically.php?faculty_id=123 >>>> http://www.rsc.org/shop/books/2008/9780854042722.asp >>>> >>>> >>>> ---- Original message ---- >>>>> Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2010 17:12:26 +0000 >>>>> From: CCP4 bulletin board <CCP4BB@JISCMAIL.AC.UK> (on behalf of John R >>>>> Helliwell <jrhelliw...@gmail.com>) >>>>> Subject: Re: [ccp4bb] Citations in supplementary material >>>>> To: CCP4BB@JISCMAIL.AC.UK >>>>> >>>>> Dear Victor, >>>>> I strongly support the stance that is in the Acta D Editorial. >>>>> Manfred Weiss worked very hard assembling those details and over quite >>>>> some time; he deserves our thanks. >>>>> Greetings, >>>>> John >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> On Wed, Nov 17, 2010 at 4:06 PM, Victor Lamzin <vic...@embl-hamburg.de> >>>>> wrote: >>>>>> Dear All, >>>>>> >>>>>> I would like to bring to your attention the recent Editorial in Acta >>>>>> Cryst D >>>>>> (http://journals.iucr.org/d/issues/2010/12/00/issconts.html), which >>>>>> highlights the long-standing issue of under-citation of papers published >>>>>> in >>>>>> the IUCr journals. The Editorial, having looked at the papers published >>>>>> in >>>>>> 2009 in Nature, Science, Cell and PNAS, concluded: >>>>>> >>>>>> 'almost half of all references to publications in IUCr journals end up >>>>>> being >>>>>> published in the supplementary material only... Not only does this mean >>>>>> that >>>>>> the impact factor of IUCr journals should be higher, but also that the >>>>>> real >>>>>> overall numbers of citations of methods papers are much higher than what >>>>>> is >>>>>> reported, for instance, by the Web of Science' >>>>>> >>>>>> Although this topic may seem to concern mostly methods developers, I >>>>>> think >>>>>> the whole research community will only benefit from more fair credit >>>>>> that we >>>>>> all give to our colleagues via referencing their publications. What do >>>>>> you >>>>>> think? >>>>>> >>>>>> Victor >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> -- >>>>> Professor John R Helliwell DSc >>>> >> > -- Professor John R Helliwell DSc
