From: Sean Andrews <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thu, 15 Dec 2011 10:15:16 -0600
Subject: Re: Crisis in peer-reviewing?


Is this really a trend?  And

> From: Henrietta Thornton <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2011 10:19:10 -0500
>
> 'Others just cite the "refereeing is free labor for large publishing
> corporations" argument, as if that makes it alright' -- I'd like some
> more from him on what's wrong with that argument.

I think the author's point is that this is a cop out when a colleague
is asking for your help in what continues to be a widely accepted
enterprise.  In this case, the labor may ultimately benefit large
publishing houses, but on a different scale, it is also benefiting
your colleagues, your discipline, etc.  Since we don't yet live in a
world where these two scales can be easily parsed, citing this
argument is really just an excuse for not doing the work.  After all,
the colleagues in question likely read that corporate aided
scholarship, work at corporate funded institutions, and support
corporate profits more generally when they buy their shoes, food,
computers, etc.  Work to change the system; work with your colleague
to shift their editorial work to a different system; start an Open
Access journal; meanwhile, don't ditch them just because they are
acting like rational scholars in the current publishing environment.

Sean Andrews