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Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

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Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#391

Post by dalke »

chris_wot wrote: post #371
dalke wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had no intention to argue against your character, nor upon rereading do I see myself doing that. I do argue against the meaningfulness of your comments, given the judgement in Eldred, and given the last 250 years of incessant technological change. I also think you, like many, see the near history with a much better focus than the further past. But that is not a character flaw.

Well, I'm glad to see I was wrong :-) thank you. It's just you seemed to compare my, uh, rhetoric to what the "populists and muckrackers" of the 1900s were saying. Though in certain company I guess that could be considered high praise, I'm not sure I was too fond of the comparison...

My intent was to say that 100 years ago people would have said that the muckrakers and populists pushed for a level of "openness and transparency" which had never before been seen. I don't see how that is coupled to your character.

In the 1970s, after the Watergate hearings and the new FOIA and Sunshine laws, people again could have, and likely did, say that it was also a level of openness and transparency which had never before been seen.

Your essential argument seems to be "things are different now so throw out the old". But things always change, so that argument is always true, and can be therefore be used to justify anything.

Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#392

Post by alphydan »

joshvm wrote: post #373
alphydan wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Popularity plays a role. Here's a real life example: One of my quantum physics mentors submitted a paper to PRL (a high prestige physics journal) and it was rejected. Why? Because it came from a small, rather unknown university in Spain. He was later admitted to Cambridge for a PhD and sent the exact same paper (same formatting, content, layout but different department/uni). It was immediately accepted. Does it neces…

Phys Rev Lett isn't double blind? Double blind doesn't always work, sometimes it's painfully obvious who the PI is, but it should stop stuff like this from happening.

I haven't published there in a while but I don't think so.

> We are no longer able to accede to requests from authors that we withhold their identities from the referees. Such "double-blind" reviewing has been discontinued. [0]

[0] https://journals.aps.org/prl/authors/editorial-policies-prac...

Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#393

Post by timrpeterson »

apricot wrote: post #369
timrpeterson wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they can and academic scientists don't do anything to change the status quo.

I wouldn't say scientists are doing nothing. See for instance the "Cost of Knowledge" project spearheaded by top mathematicians: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cost_of_Knowledge

Not much seeing much output from that initiative which I signed btw.

Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#394

Post by chris_wot »

dalke wrote: post #391
chris_wot wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I'm glad to see I was wrong :-) thank you. It's just you seemed to compare my, uh, rhetoric to what the "populists and muckrackers" of the 1900s were saying. Though in certain company I guess that could be considered high praise, I'm not sure I was too fond of the comparison...

My intent was to say that 100 years ago people would have said that the muckrakers and populists pushed for a level of "openness and transparency" which had never before been seen. I don't see how that is coupled to your character. In the 1970s, after the Watergate hearings and the new FOIA and Sunshine laws, people again could have, and likely did, say that it was also a level of openness and transparency which had…

Not all things always change. Like change, for instance. Change that doesn't change remains the same. Just sayin' :-)

Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#395

Post by dalke »

chris_wot wrote: post #394
dalke wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My intent was to say that 100 years ago people would have said that the muckrakers and populists pushed for a level of "openness and transparency" which had never before been seen. I don't see how that is coupled to your character. In the 1970s, after the Watergate hearings and the new FOIA and Sunshine laws, people again could have, and likely did, say that it was also a level of openness and transparency which had…

Not all things always change. Like change, for instance. Change that doesn't change remains the same. Just sayin' :-)

Or, as I pointed out, the existence of copyright, which brings us full circle.

Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#396

Post by PeterisP »

tomp wrote: post #163
parenthephobia wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mainly it's a chicken and egg situation. A journal is prestigious because the papers it publishes have an allusion of quality, because they are published by a prestigious journal. A prestigious journal publishes high-quality papers because it can attract high-quality authors and reviewers, because it is a prestigious journal. A journal is prestigious because researchers choose to (try to) be published in it, because…

> If you were trying to bootstrap a new journal, you'd have a tough time; unless you didn't care about its quality. You could (should?) start by going through freely published (open access) papers, collecting the most quality ones, then publishing them in your journal. That's most of the value of journals, as well - informing the subscribers of noteworthy research.

Your journal wouldn't ever be considered prestigious or even moderately average if you're re-publishing old articles instead of publishing actual novel research.

You could create a newsletter that's useful to some, but if anyone would consider to publish their new research findings in your journal, then that would be bad for them since it wouldn't be considered anywhere equal to a "proper" publication (since you openly claim to accept non-novel findings as well) and would also prevent them from ever publishing it in any "better" journal since that would not be unpublished research any more.

In practice new good journals are generally started by (sub)communities who know each other and feel that [a topic of] their discipline is not adequately covered by the existing journals. This means that since day 1 they have (a) a source of good new papers that they will want to send there and not elsewhere - the whole reason for them founding the journal, (b) a pool of respected and knowledgeable editors/reviewers (the same community), and (c) initial interest of the community who would all read (and cite) the journal. Given that, the only missing part is recognition by various indexes and funding agencies, which will arrive within a few years (3-5?) if the new journal is well run, productive and gets appropriate citations outside of it.

Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#397

Post by dalke »

PeterisP wrote: post #396
tomp wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you were trying to bootstrap a new journal, you'd have a tough time; unless you didn't care about its quality. You could (should?) start by going through freely published (open access) papers, collecting the most quality ones, then publishing them in your journal. That's most of the value of journals, as well - informing the subscribers of noteworthy research.

Your journal wouldn't ever be considered prestigious or even moderately average if you're re-publishing old articles instead of publishing actual novel research. You could create a newsletter that's useful to some, but if anyone would consider to publish their new research findings in your journal, then that would be bad for them since it wouldn't be considered anywhere equal to a "proper" publication (since you open…

It could select papers from preprints. That's what several overlay journals do.

But I'm commenting now more to point out that some journals do accept non-novel findings, like 'Journal of Negative Results in BioMedicine'.

Re: Who's downloading pirated papers? Everyone

#398

Post by brianpgordon »

dalke wrote: post #172
Fuxy wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't we solved the quality issue in other situations by giving users the ability to rate a scientific paper. What's wrong with giving other researchers the ability to rate and comment on a paper. It's a not a perfect filter but I would argue it works just as well a this journal reputation system and it prevents issues like people having to publish with them to get recognized not to mention it encourages discussion…

"by giving users the ability to rate a scientific paper." LOL! No. Ratings are nearly useless. By which I mean I don't know how I would incorporate ratings into my own research. How do you keep a ratings system from being a proxy for popularity, rather than a measure of novelty or utility? How do you keep it from being easily gamed? Does a "5.2" for a 1995 paper have the same meaning as a "5.2" for a 2010 paper? "You…

> Unless "1 cent => public domain always", then there's no clear line. Is that your argument?

I don't see a problem with this. If you want public money, you have to put your work in the public domain. That's just a condition of getting the money.

The NIH does this. If you receive a single penny from an NIH grant, the work must be posted to PubMed.

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