Letter to the Editor: publish, publish … cursed!

Abstract

This paper comments on the phenomenon of “publish or perish” associated with the current information explosion and its awful consequence: the curse that hangs over academia which dooms it to publish incessantly irrelevant and pointless documents. The overabundance of publications is not justified and is not even necessary in many contexts for personal promotion, and even less for the advancement of science. Therefore, the current role of scientific journals is highly questionable that its aim could be misleading. Huge numbers of articles are published, but they are not read because the aim is principally “publish for publish,” or publication for its own sake. The standard corrective tool for improving scientific communication—peer review—cannot function adequately, and biases and perversions are introduced which undermine society’s confidence in the scientific enterprise. A dark landscape unfurls itself across the world of scientific information, forcing us to question and improve its current state. Methodologically this paper goes halfway between the essay and the review trying to provoke engaged and useful controversy.

Between panic and motivation: did the first wave of COVID-19 affect scientific publishing in Mediterranean countries?

“…The number of COVID-19 publications increased dramatically in the health sciences, followed by the life, physical, social, and interdisciplinary sciences. This finding is somewhat in line with Fernandez-Cano ( 2021 )’s list of core subject areas, which include Science and Technology, Social Sciences, and Art and Humanities. Moreover, the most significant differences in most COVID-19-relevant medical disciplines were found in virology, immunology, and infectious diseases, which vary slightly from the rankings of Zhang et al ( 2020 )—virology and infectious diseases.…”

“…Dinis-Oliveira ( 2020 ) used the term "paperdemic” to describe this accelerated publication rate and its harmful impacts on science. To emphasize these side effects, Fernandez-Cano ( 2021 ) titled his letter to the editor "publish, publish… cursed!". In this vein, a commentary by Moradi and Abdi ( 2020 ) noted multiple corrections and erratum published regarding the significantly increased volume of COVID-19 publications.…”

Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Research: A Bibliometric Analysis over a 50-Year Period

“…With an 8% growth rate, it would take only 8.75 years for the number of articles to double. While increased research funding over time could be a reason for this growth [ 27 ], the pressure-to-publish culture among academia in recent times [ 28 , 29 ] might also have played a role. In addition, the steep rise from 1990 to 1991 could be attributed to a change in the abstracting algorithm in WoS in 1990, where KeyWords Plus indexing was introduced in 1990 [ 30 ].…”

The Role of Publons in the Context of Open Peer Review

“…Traditionally, peer reviewers (and editors) work voluntarily (i.e., freely) for journals and publishers to conduct pre-publication peer review, as “useful slaves”, as Fernández-Cano [ 11 ] describes them, or as part of science’s “gift economy” [ 12 ]. The rationale for free labor (peer reviewing, which is actually equivalent to a professional consultation service) is that a reviewer serves the community (i.e., has communal obligations) and provides support to academia (i.e., reciprocity) [ 13 ].…”