From: Jim O'Donnell <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue, 13 Aug 2013 19:18:36 +0800

EDANZ:  Heard a presentation today in Singapore at the annual Fiesole
Retreat (very strong program here!) about a company called Edanz ---
www.edanzediting.com  (see also: http://www.casalini.it/retreat/)

Their pitch is that they work with scientific journal authors who need
help getting published.  Their focus is on China and Japan, where they
believe there are large numbers of worthy scientists who have
inordinate difficulty getting published.  These are scholars and
scientists and physicians and the like who need help at several
levels:  editing the English of their articles; identifying
appropriate journals to which to submit; interpreting the sometimes
curt and cavalier communications of journal editors surrounding peer
review; and revising for resubmission.  They have a fee schedule,
rapid turnaround time (a week for a fairly heavy intervention), and a
stable of native-English editors standing by to help you.

The presentation was thought-provoking in several ways.  The speaker
argued that journals should emphasize an author-centric perspective
and work hard to deliver a positive experience for authors.  He backed
this argument with surveys and anecdotes that make clear that peer
review is often a hard barrier to climb for the non-English speaker
just at the level of figuring out whether this letter from the editor
really is an acceptance, a rejection or a revise-and-resubmit letter.

And almost anyone could use their find-a-journal service, which they
animate by taking a chunk of your text and pattern-matching against
many journals to see whose content is most like what you are writing;
then they look at impact factor, selectivity, and turnaround time and
make recommendations.  Several major publishers work with them
happily.

This was a description of a service that I had never imagined was
needed; but on hearing, immediately recognized the appeal.  I could
imagine such a service run in an exploitative way (the "Famous Writers
School" of yore comes to mind), but I can equally imagine one -- and
this seems to be Edanz -- genuinely interested in making a living by
offering a *real* service.

(Another presentation at this very good retreat had figures suggesting
that Chinese and Japanese scholars have much more likelihood of having
grant money to support publication than US and European scholars do.
Spending some of that money fixing up your prose and finding the right
journal makes perfect sense.)

Jim O'Donnell