Really, the standard of discourse needs to be higher than this. People are turned down for tenure all the time because of poor publication history, and "poor" in this context means any journal that has earned itself a reputation for low quality, regardless
of "business model." Calling a journal "predatory" is simply giving another twist to the knife, but the wound was invariably self-inflicted to begin with.
But of course I'm begging the question here because no evidence has been produced regarding which journals were mislabeled as predatory and which scholars were damaged as a result. I see no reason why this assertion should be taken at face value. It's
merely hearsay and gossip at this point. It would be foolish and unethical to claim this as a basis for acknowledging "that Beall's whims had negative consequences." Such a statement constitutes its own form of harassment.
What goes unperceived by Beall's detractors is the positive impact his list had in preventing scholars from getting scammed by the most unscrupulous members of his list. In this sense it provided an important and hygienic function for those trying to navigate
an increasingly disordered journal environment.
As someone whose day job is publishing journals, I had numerous occasions to consult Beall's list, and also corresponded with him about its contents. I can't claim to have gone thoroughly through all or even most of its contents, but I never found anything
that looked like it didn't belong, nor did any of my communications suggest the slightest degree of whimsy on Beall's part. It was all practical, rigorous editorial judgement.
In hindsight, perhaps he should have issued a trigger warning for the more vulnerable souls and egos.
Michael Magoulias
Director, Journals
University of Chicago Press
From: David Prosser <
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Date: Wed, 7 Jun 2017 07:20:05 +0000
Indeed. And the lives and livelihoods of some of people who worked for the publishers that were arbitrarily targeted by the list were affected. There is no excuse for harassment, but there must be an acknowledgement that Beall’s
whims had negative consequences, consequences that we magnified by the importance we collectively gave to the list .
David
From: Aline Soules <
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Date: Mon, 5 Jun 2017 21:56:29 -0700
Unfortunately, some of the journals on the list weren't predatory;
yet, in some tenure cases, publications were discounted because the
journal was on the list. If anyone picks up on this list again, I
hope the first thing the person does is check on the status of every
journal on the list. This affects people's work lives significantly.
Aline
--
Aline Soules, Library Faculty
California State University, East Bay
25800 Carlos Bee Blvd.
Hayward, CA 94542
510-885-4596
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