[zero_k]

Publishing in Academia is a scam. Nowadays everyone puts their papers also on arxiv.org so at least we can read each other's papers for free. While of course still paying the fees to these publishers who are doing nothing but messing up the PDF (I have to fight them to fix the mistakes they add every time a paper is published), while claiming to do a value-add, which happens to add value to nobody but their own pockets. It's a scam through and through.

Of course one has to examine why this system is still in place. And it's mostly to do with policies in universities, where certain journals/conferences are valued more, and changing that is hard, because e.g. Springer happens to own the name. So we all pay millions to Springer, for the use of this name (that we, together, made great, not Springer), and in return, they charge us the privilege of reading the papers that we reviewed, edited, and wrote. It's insane, but it can't be changed as long as universities refuse to change.

So the hard truth is, it's not Springer/IEEE/Nature/etc, it's ultimately, us.

[logifail]

> Publishing in Academia is a scam

Relatively soon after starting work on my PhD, one of my more-experienced colleagues explained the affect of "impact factor" on academic publishing. Back then I was young and naive, and assumed that at least impact factor itself would be some kind of open system based on freely-available data.

Many years later, I read up on this and discovered Web of Science/Clarivate :(

How is it possible that scientists and academics are gated from the most important metrics based on their own output and by which they measure themselves and are measured by those who fund them?

It's completely nuts.

[coliveira]

My reply is that people want to live in a capitalist country, but don't want to live with the consequences of that. This is one of the consequences.

[smsm42]

No it is not. There's nothing in the capitalist model that mandates academic community to maintain a zero-valued-add gatekeepers. It's just an extremely lazy dunk, which happens each time somebody discusses any rent-seeker setup - somebody comes out of the woodwork and proclaims "oh, it's because of capitalism!". In a very very very dumb sense it is - like the reason of crime is that people are breathing. If they didn't they'd be dead, and there were no possibility of them to be criminal. It is this level of lazy and useless logic. Yes, capitalism allows rent-seekers to exist. But it in no way mandates their existence - a model without rent-seekers is as compatible - I would say even more compatible - with capitalism as one with them. Just don't make this kind of lazy dunks anymore, it really adds nothing to the problem.

[coliveira]

To avoid the rent seeking you need a state that will enforce laws that prohibit the rent seeking process and revert it when it has formed. This is not compatible with free market capitalism in abstract (being against the freedom of capitalist agents), and in practice it cannot be done because the capitalists will use political power to stop it.

[smsm42]

It is one pissible solution - just as one possible solution for theft is abolishing private property. If there's no property, nobody could steal anything. But it's not the only solution. There are many other ways - such as not employing the services of rent seekers, for example - that do not require government involvement. In some markets, this solution is blocked - usually by, guess what, goverment regulations - but as far as I can see, no goverment forces academia to elevate Elseveir to its pedestal.

[thunky]

Based on what OP is saying, if capitalism was really working here then Springer would be out of business - because they don't provide any value.

It seems what we have here is a cultural problem.

[aspenmayer]

In this case, it seems close to a prisoner's dilemma.

That would make the researchers the prisoners and Springer the jailer in this analogy.

All researchers are incentivized to defect to the jailer(s)/private publishers until they know that there is a critical mass of prisoners willing to make a prison break/switch to open access journals.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner's_dilemma

[ffsm8]

Honestly, you have an idealized view on capitalism.

It's still the most productive system humanity has ever used at scale, but capitalism favors monopolies, cartels and every other anti-competitive behavior you can think of.

That's why we have regulations against such behavior. Even if - as it turns out- these regulations can still be weaponized by bad acteurs to ultimately strengthen their hold on markets

[Sardtok]

He did say "if capitalism was really working". I at least read that as "working as intended", i.e. as the capitalistic ideal.

[ffsm8]

Yes, and my point was that the capitalistic ideal does not mean fair competition.

Because capitalism inherently favours anti-competitive behavior. If it didn't, we wouldn't have had to pass legislation to outlaw it.

Quoting "not real capitalism" as am argument is at the same level as saying "we just didn't try real socialism yet". That's technically true, too. And we likely never will.

[littlestymaar]

People want to live in free and democratic countries and in that respect capitalism is the least bad of the totalitarian regimes that exists…

[coliveira]

If you truly believe that capitalism is the best way to "live in free and democratic countries", then you should welcome what Elsevier and others are doing, because that is a direct consequence of their "freedom" to pursue profits.

[smsm42]

No I should not. That's like saying if I support free speech, I must welcome lying and insulting others. Supporting free speech means allowing people to speak without being persecuted, but that does not mean I must value all speech equally. Both myself and the society still can pass value judgement and value different kinds of speech differently. Same with business conduct - the fact that this conduct is not explicitly criminal does not in any way mean everybody should "welcome" it. There is a wide area between criminal conduct and welcome conduct, and the society and the culture has appropriate means to regulate it. If the academic institutions and the scientists would not value publication is Elsevier journals so much, and would not buy their subscriptions, Elsevier would not exist. It is not because Elsevier is doing something criminal, it is because people decided to behave in ways that allow Elsevier to rent-seek. They can change this behavior, and they absolutely do not need to join the Communist party for that or welcome Elsevier. Those aren't the only choices.

[coliveira]

> people decided to behave in ways that allow Elsevier to rent-seek

Your liberal ideology results in a confusion about what it means to rent-seek. This is possible only if people have no way to escape the rent. Elsevier and other companies do this by restricting the freedom of readers, since the publisher has a monopoly of access to scientific publications. It is not a matter of user behavior, since scientists cannot choose to ignore published research. The only other option available is breaking the law.

[littlestymaar]

I never said it's the best, it's actually pretty bad at it (and if you re-read what I've written, you'd see that I consider Capitalism to be a form of totalitarianism). It's just arguably miles ahead of the alternatives that currently exist…

[coliveira]

If you truly considered capitalism a form of totalitarianism, you wouldn't be advocating for it, nor suggesting that people who love democracy would be interested in such a system.

[impendia]

As an academic, I agree with almost everything you say -- but I wouldn't blame policies in universities. As much as I hate all the bureaucracy, I can't blame it here.

Academics are periodically called upon to pass judgment on other academics. It's an unsavory part of our job, but given that there are fewer jobs, less grant funding, etc. than the number of strong applications, it's a necessary evil.

To the best we can, we try to evaluate their research record directly. But it is maddeningly difficult to evaluate work even slightly out of your field, and so journals serve as a signaling mechanism.

And here I agree again with what you say: we are paying millions to Springer, Elsevier, etc. for the use of their names. ("Ooh, this person published in Inventiones Mathematicae!") Which we we made great.

As much as I despise this system, if you believe that universities can change this, at the level of policy, I am very curious to hear what you propose.

[sonzohan]

> As much as I despise this system, if you believe that universities can change this, at the level of policy, I am very curious to hear what you propose.

MIT did not renew their contract with Elsevier in 2020, a major reason being their inequitable profit model, and refusal to honor open access agreements. They have a postmortem saying the loss had little impact to their researchers.

How about that for a policy change?

> we are paying millions to Springer, Elsevier, etc. for the use of their names.

As an academic researcher, you are (or your institution is) paying them millions in publication and subscription fees so you can keep your job. Publish or perish.

[jasode]

>MIT did not renew their contract with Elsevier in 2020, a major reason being their inequitable profit model, and refusal to honor open access agreements. They have a postmortem saying the loss had little impact to their researchers.

This "fact" about MIT cancelling the Elsevier subscription is often cited but in isolation, it's misleading because it makes seem like MIT students and faculty don't even need Elsevier articles. That's not true.

What happened is that MIT switched to a pay-per-article or library loan method: https://libraries.mit.edu/scholarly/publishing/how-to-access...

MIT in providing some other access methods to the same Elsevier articles for their researchers -- at the cost of some extra inconvenient steps -- is actually proving the opposite of the anti-publisher stance: The Elsevier publisher's articles are still valuable to us.

It's the subscription they cancelled and not the articles.

[sonzohan]

> It's the subscription they cancelled and not the articles.

Correct. Before the UC system also cancelled their subscription with Elsevier they reported paying $11 million annually.

> The Elsevier publisher's articles are still valuable to us.

Yes, but not $11 million/year with a 3 year lock-in. UC reported (at the time of ending the contract) that they have a perpetual license to ~95% of relevant work on Elsevier, so that $11 million/year went to access 5% of Elsevier's library.

What we do see is publishers shifting to open access (OA), which appears to result in lower Uni costs, but shifts the expense burden to researchers. Researchers in the UC system are now asked to use grant funding to help pay OA APC fees.

[lesuorac]

> As an academic researcher, you are (or your institution is) paying them millions in publication and subscription fees so you can keep your job. Publish or perish.

This ultimately sounds contradictory to your comment about MIT. It seems that by not renewing the Elsevier contract a university would have more funding for jobs?

[sonzohan]

Could you explain the contradiction you are seeing further?

Cost cutting and increased personnel funding are not related. Just because MIT library is saving millions by cutting a publisher agreement doesn't mean those savings will be directed towards increased staff.

[g-b-r]

Gather together and begin publishing your own journals (even just in the form of a website)?

If it's you who made the existing journals great, you probably can do it again?

[impendia]

This is a coordination problem.

There are some efforts in this direction; for example, the researchers who led the Elsevier boycott

http://thecostofknowledge.com/

started a free open-access journal

https://discreteanalysisjournal.com/about

in which I'm proud to have a paper accepted.

But it's difficult to dislodge the existing system quickly, even if everyone involved wants to.

[g-b-r]

That's one good news!

Yes, and I wouldn't be surprised if there were some kicbacks involved, at some universities

[da_chicken]

That's just kicking the can down the road.

[g-b-r]

In what way? I meant freely accessible journals, of course (making journals, or "journals", of their own, would probably cost much less than the subscriptions they're currently paying)

[the8472]

Sounds like a coordination problem? Couldn't university departments sign pledges that they'll stop using those journals if N peer institutions in their country do too?

[RobotToaster]

Sounds like a form of prisoners' dilemma.

[sizzle]

You forgot Elsevier in your list

[rmbyrro]

Sounds like a government

[teleforce]

> Publishing in Academia is a scam

Using your logic any publishing is a scam including blogging where monetary renumeration does matters [1]

> Nowadays everyone puts their papers also on arxiv.org so at least we can read each other's papers for free

Do you realize that not everyone can get their paper published in Arxiv, it's a free journal masquerading as a pre-print server? [2]

> Of course one has to examine why this system is still in place.

Hmm because it does work albeit the imperfections?

[1] How Do Bloggers Actually Make Money?

https://www.gillianperkins.com/blog/bloggers-actually-make-m...

[2] alphaXiv: Open research discussion on top of arXiv:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41485814

[michaelmior]

> which happens to add value to nobody but their own pockets.

While publishers as they exist now are not necessary for this, the publishing process does typically incorporate peer review which has significant value. I agree that things need to change, but I don't think it's true that zero value is added by publishers.

[sonzohan]

> does typically incorporate peer review which has significant value.

Significant value which is given gratis by said peers, which journals use to boost their reputability and, by association, their profits. Publishers are profiting off of free labor from subject matter experts. Even more disappointing is this free labor is viewed as a right of passage. Don't forget that the author spent hundreds to thousands of dollars to access these unpaid peers. Publishers are increasingly well-known as scammy. It's why MIT ended their Elsevier contract, and why many other R1s are following suit.

Also don't get me started on the dubious quality of peer review in todays "Publish or Perish" climate.

[jampekka]

> It's why MIT ended their Elsevier contract, and why many other R1s are following suit.

I think focusing on Elsevier is/was a mistake. All the publishers are running the exact same racket. Even non-profits like IEEE. It's a disgrace.

[relaxing]

Elsevier are the biggest and most aggressive in driving up prices.

But you’re right the others aren’t far behind.

[michaelmior]

I agree that the value is primarily given by the peers. However, someone needs to coordinate the process. That said, while I can understand viewing it as free labor, it is often (indirectly) part of the job description of faculty members.

[thomasahle]

In many fields, particularly those that rely on conferences over journals, peer review is organized by others, not the publisher. So here they are truly doing nothing but hosting the papers behind their pay wall.

[jampekka]

Peer review and editing is done free by academics. Publishers "facilitate" this by having horrible unusable sofware platforms from the 90's for this. These are actually worse than nothing, as review would be a lot easier to organize and conduct via e-mail.

Publishers don't add value, they subtract it.

People probably have hard time undersanding this because the system is so absurd and so obvious racket they don't think such can exist.

[michaelmior]

I am an academic who spends a nontrivial amount of time reviewing papers. My experience has been that the platforms used for submitting reviews are perfectly fine. Often outdated, sure, but I've never really found this to be a significant barrier. I would personally find it more challenging to manage reviews via email.

[jampekka]

For reviewers they are usually least bad, but still bad. For example Manuscript Central still requires pop-ups and can be more or less impossible to use with mobile devices. It also has separate login for all journals and password rules that makes it very common for people (including me) to have to reset the password every time they need to log in.

For editors they tend to be a lot worse. E.g. with Editorial Manager adding reviewers is really painful and the search is totally useless. The process to add and be added as a reviewer takes multiple messages in a quite confusing process. Decision letters are sent with bizarre template hacks that are really easy to mess up.

Some submission systems still require formatting of images etc to some arcane formats like tiff and eps. Or to have figures and captions as separate pages. These cause significant work for submitters and are a disaster to review.

Compared to typical enterprise systems they could be even worse, but I'd say still worse than average in that class too.

Don't know if these are a significant barrier. For me they have been and I've resigned as an editor due to the unusability. But I find that they easily cause enough loss in time and nerves of authors, reviewers and editors to be of negative value.

[michaelmior]

I will admit that MC is pretty annoying. Particularly the issue of having separate login/passwords for all journals. I haven't been in the position of Editor at this point, so I can't speak from that perspective.

I haven't yet run into submissions systems as arcane as those you mention in terms of format requirements, but that does indeed sound very messy and I hope I never see it.

[shaky-carrousel]

Peer reviewing could be made easier by public key cryptography. You could establish a web of trust between reviewers.

[jampekka]

I see no need for that. There are no problems with verifiying identities of reviewers.

[shaky-carrousel]

It could enable to have a decentralised web of trust of reviewers. In the same vein it is used to verify identities, you can use it to assess the reliability of a reviewer. A reviewer could sign another reviewer's key with the confidence it has about their reviewing.

[jampekka]

This is done via academic credentials, mostly by publishing in the same field.

I don't think there are any major technical challenges in publishing or peer review. It's not complicated at all. The problems are sociological.

[fanf2]

Peer review is done for free by academics. The publisher does not contribute to peer review.

[michaelmior]

The publisher does often assist with coordinating the peer review process which is a nontrivial task. I'm not saying this in itself necessitates everything else surrounding the publishing ecosystem, but I don't think it's accurate to say the publisher does not contribute.

[jampekka]

In my editor experience the assistance is minimal at best. Editors (almost all upaid) assess suitability of manuscripts, find the reviewers and handle all communication.