From: Stevan Harnad <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Mon, 27 May 2013 00:33:50 -0400

On 2013-05-26, at 6:54 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> From: Kevin Smith <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Fri, 24 May 2013 01:52:06 +0000
>
> My fundamental criticism, Jeffrey, is not with the criteria you use to
> identify predatory practices, but with your limitation of their
> application to OA publishers.  And even if we accept the rationale for
> that limitation that some of the representatives of the traditional
> business model for publishing have suggested on this list, I still
> have a question.  Now that the American Journal of Public Health has
> announced that they are extending their embargo period on open access
> for older articles from 2 to 10 years, and have asked authors to pay
> $1000 for OA if they want to shorten that period -- and these are
> authors who expected OA after two years when they published in AJPH --
> will you list that journal as predatory?  If not, why not?

I don't know what Jeffrey will reply, but it seems obvious to me that
predatory Gold OA authors are preying on authors by cashing in on
their publish-or-perish needs by purporting to provide peer review you
but not doing it.

Yes, there are bottom-feeding subscription journals too, but they are
not preying on authors by purporting to provide them with peer review.
If libraries subscribe to junk journals, they get what they paid for.

And, as I said earlier, it takes a much bigger investment (and risk)
to start up a subscription journal and hope to get enough library
subscriptions to make ends meet than to set up a website and dupe
authors into paying for a pig in a pole.

To attract subscriptions, you first need to build up a track record for
quality. To prey on authors, all you need to do is create a website,
make a lot of sanctmonious (and fashionable) noise about being
"Open Access," andwait for your prey to bite. Even if authors only
ever publish with you  once, and never come back again, you'll have
made a nice bundle  with no investment.

Stevan Harnad

>> From: "Beall, Jeffrey" <[log in to unmask]>
>> Date: Thu, 23 May 2013 13:32:36 -0600
>>
>> Dear Kevin and members of the list:
>>
>> I would like to clarify an apparent misunderstanding regarding the
>> criteria I have established for determining predatory open-access
>> scholarly publishers. In his recent email, Kevin wrote:
>>
>> "My principal objection to Beall's list is that it is critical of only
>> some of those practices, based on the business model employed.  Why is
>> to predatory to ask an author to pay a few hundred dollars in
>> processing charges for open access, but not predatory to increase a
>> small college's subscription to a single journal 300% overnight (which
>> has happened several times, in my experience, when small society
>> journals are bought by large commercial publishers)?"
>>
>> Nowhere have I said that charging processing fees equates to a journal
>> or publisher being predatory. Indeed, there are dozens or hundreds of
>> gold OA journals that charge such fees that are not on my lists. Could
>> you point out any specific examples where my language implies that the
>> article processing fee alone was indicated as the reason for
>> classifying a publisher
>> as predatory? Upon seeing these, I'll clarify the language, as this
>> was not my intent.
>>
>> My criticism is not directed at the gold OA publishing model but at
>> those who exploit it for their own unwarranted profit.
>>
>> Thank you,
>>
>> Jeffrey Beall, MA, MSLS, Associate Professor
>> Scholarly Initiatives Librarian
>> Auraria Library
>> University of Colorado Denver
>> Denver, Colo.  80204 USA
>> [log in to unmask]