Sciencedomain International fights against predatory publishers

Many open-access publishers publish low-quality research papers. They only want to make easy money, so they publish whatever articles they receive without peer review. Some publishers publish articles in their journals within one or two days after submission, if they receive the publication charge. Jeffrey Beall, the Denver-based former librarian, first coined the term “predatory publishing” in 2011, to identify such ‘pay to publish’ journals, who publish anything without peer review. But at the later stage, his intention and methodology to identify predatory journals were questioned. Many academicians proved that Beall's evaluation was biased and highly erroneous. Please see the related discussion here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Beall. But nobody can deny the contribution of Mr. Beall to identify the black side of open access scholarly publication.

‘Sciencedomain International’ fights against predatory publication practices for many years. ‘Sciencedomain International’ is also a victim of predatory publication model and many times ‘Sciencedomain International’ was labelled with “predatory” stamp, as ‘Sciencedomain International’ also follow open access publication model. Confusion and mixing the name of ‘Sciencedomain International’ with low-quality predatory publishers harmed the brand image and business of ‘Sciencedomain International’ in many ways.

Some distinguished operating principles of ‘Sciencedomain International’ are discussed below. These below mentioned points clearly prove the difference of ‘Sciencedomain International’ with predatory publishers.

1. OPEN Peer review:

‘Sciencedomain International’ International journals follow a transparent and robust OPEN peer review model. All peer review reports, comments of the editors and different versions of the manuscripts are also made publicly posted along with the published paper. This process eradicates any possibility of malicious interference by the publisher to publish papers only for money, by compromising academic quality. The main complaint against predatory publishers is that anybody can publish anything by paying hefty money. And predatory publishers compromise the peer review process or don't do peer review to publish any paper. As ‘Sciencedomain International’ journals follow transparent OPEN peer review model, so the main criteria of predatory publishing can not be applied against ‘Sciencedomain International’. Very politely we want to tell that our peer review system is not perfect. But we strongly want to say that we don't follow the predatory publication model.

Some examples:

a. http://bit.ly/open-review-2

b.  http://bit.ly/open-review-3

c. http://bit.ly/open-review-4  

1.1 World famous Science Journal article authenticated high peer review standard of SDI journal

Now it is obvious that all publisher will tell good about itself. But to establish the claim of a publisher, it must be authenticated by some third-party neutral agency. Please see that our claim of the high standard of peer review is authenticated by the world-famous Science journal article.  Please see the investigative report here (http://bit.ly/science-report-111). It was reported that out of total 304 journals, only 20 journals rejected the fake article after substantial peer review. We are happy that our journal was among these few successful journals along with industry leaders like PLoS One, Hindawi, etc.

2. POST-publication peer review:

The pre-publication Peer review evaluation system is not perfect and many academicians proved loop-holes of the peer review system. We also never claimed that the peer review system is perfect. But we have tried to make it as transparent as possible. But still, we know that there will be errors. So we introduced also POST-publication peer review system.  SDI journal Web sites provide the ability for users to comment on articles to facilitate community evaluation and discourse around published articles. The comment section is mainly dedicated to promote "Post-publication peer review". Please see here: http://bit.ly/post-peer-review.  As a result of this "Post-publication peer review", if authors agree and or journal Editors agree (and or SDI agrees) that any correction is necessary, then it will be published FREE of cost by following SDI Correction and retraction policy (http://bit.ly/retraction-policy).

3. Transparent Editorial Board:

All SDI journals have a transparent editorial board. Many times predatory journals post the name of editors without their consent. Sometimes predatory journals publish fictitious editors. All SDI journals publish complete academic affiliation of all editors. Additionally, SDI journals publish email ID, short biography and link of the institutional webpage of editors for complete transparency. All communications with the editors are also permanently digitally preserved. Along with the published paper, identity and comments of the academic editor are also published. Therefore, very politely we want to say that we may not have the strongest editors of the world. But we have a highly transparent and active editorial board to maintain the quality of the journal.

3.1 World famous Nature journal article confirmed the high standard of SDI editors and journals

Now it is necessary to provide the proof of the high standard of editors of SDI journals. We hereby provide the proof from an article of world-famous NATURE journal article. One of our journals was also targeted by the authors of this NATURE article as part of the sting operation.  We are happy to inform that Nature (Impact Factor: 41.6) article confirmed high standard of SDI journal and its editors.  Please, read the investigative report here (http://bit.ly/Nature-report-111).

4. Moderate Acceptance rate:

SDI journals have average 51-63%. Even some authors praised openly about our peer review system, though their paper was rejected. Please see here some proof: http://bit.ly/author-speaks1

5. Publons ranks 6 SDI journals among top 1000 journals of the world

Famous Publons (a part of Thomson Reuters Clarivate Analytics), also confirmed the high standard and transparency of peer review system of SDI journals. There are more than 40,000 academic journals worldwide. As per Publons website, 6 journals from ‘Sciencedomain International’ International was placed among top 1000 journals like Nature, Science, PlosOne, BMJ, etc. Please see here: http://bit.ly/publon-rank  (website accessed on 09-07-2018).

6. High profile authors

High standard of SDI journals has attracted authors from world famous universities like  Harvard University,  Columbia University,  Cambridge University, University of Chicago,  UC Berkeley,  Göttingen University, etc. Please see here: http://bit.ly/author-profiles

From the above discussion, it is imperative to say that ‘Sciencedomain International’ does not follow predatory publication practices.