From: David Wojick <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Mon, Nov 26, 2018 at 8:12 AM

It sounds like the researchers are pawns in a game between funders and
publishers. One can see why the researchers might be unhappy about
being put in this position, especially by their governments.

David
Inside Public Access

> On Nov 25, 2018, at 2:21 PM, Guédon Jean-Claude <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> What I am saying is that Plan S forces researchers to re-examine how they intend to prioritize their journal choices, and suddenly the dilemma is between the journal with the most desirable JIF, or the journal (or other compliant solution) that may help getting more grants from a number of funders. Interesting dilemma: instead of playing the game of publishers, you are invited to play the game of funders.
>
> Not publishing in the highest impact factor becomes a handicap only if evaluation blindly follows the JIF. So the "disadvantage" has to be examined carefully in each case.
>
> I do not understand the paragraph starting with: "The argument I’m hearing here ..."
>
> The "unilateral disarmament" argument - in passing what a terrible metphor - assumes that evaluation works absolutely the same way everywhere. With cOAlition funders, one may expect a revisiting of the ways in which evaluation is or should be conducted, or they will look totally incoherent.
>
> Regarding the big paragraph about metrics, what is a "market for ideas". The JIF does not address any "market for ideas", but rather a market for journals, which is entirely different.
>
> Regarding quality, the JIF does not refer to quality (of what, anyway? journals? Based on the average value of a counting exercise done across a highly skewed distribution of citations from article to article within the same journal), but rather to the ability of being cited, whatever the means used to achieve this goal. It vaguely refers to visibility, but Aileen Fyfe is spot on when she says that the IF refers to mere citability. The logic is that of Nielsen ratings for TV shows that had nothing ever to do with the quality of the TV broadcasts. If they did, television would not be as terrible as it has been for the last few decades.
>
> Furthermore, when your indicator allows rankings, you are no longer speaking about quality, but rather excellence: here is the game we are going to make you compete with and, through rankings, we are going to award the traditional Gold, Silver and Bronze medals.
>
> In short, lots of confusions there...
>
> Jean-Claude Guédon