Category: Academic Publishing

by Leonid Schneider November 13, 2018 14
Academic Publishing

Did Frontiers help Robert-Jan Smits design Plan S?

I obtained from the EU commission evidence that Smits was at least strongly influenced by Frontiers while designing Plan S. There were meetings with Kamila Markram and other Frontiers representatives, most notably on 25 April 2018, and a string of emails, where Smits requested and received “Frontiers feedback on the transition to OA and APCs”. Smits recently accepted the invitation as speaker next to Kamila, at a Frontiers-organised conference on 29 November 2018 in Brussels.

by Leonid Schneider November 9, 2018 6
Academic Publishing Research integrity

Fousteri affair: Dutch integrity thwarted by academic indecency

Two and a half years after Maria Fousteri was found guilty of scientific misconduct by her former employer, the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC), exactly nothing at all happened. ERC and Molecular Cell ignored LUMC letters from June 2016, while Fouster’s British co-authors interfered to save own papers. Of 4 scheduled retractions, none took place.

by Leonid Schneider October 25, 2018 8
Academic Publishing

Bremen Rector Bernd Scholz-Reiter, a hero of Open Access?

Research by German journalists revealed whole lists of German academics engaging in predatory publishing and scamferences. Named on over 60 predatory conference papers is Bernd Scholz-Reiter, Rector of the University of Bremen and former Vice-President of DFG. Several such papers are even self-plagiarised, and were used in DFG project reports and Scholz-Reiter’s rectorship application from 2011

by Leonid Schneider October 22, 2018 11
Academic Publishing

Robert-Jan Smits: scholarly societies “will have to bite the bullet and go Open Access”

I obtained a near-verbatim transcript of a video-conference Plan S architects Robert-Jan Smits and Science Europe president Marc Schiltz had on October 19th with Lynn Kamerin and other authors of the Appeal. It appears that Smits and Schiltz see the scientists and their scholarly societies as the reactionary elements blocking the road to the universal Open Access (OA).

by Leonid Schneider September 26, 2018 2
Academic Publishing Research integrity

Steffen Reinbothe: duplications planted on PNAS contributed track

This is a story of a plant scientist in France, Steffen Reinbothe. He and his sister Christiane used to hold academic positions in Germany, but now they both returned to France, to Grenoble. The move might have had to do with a dossier from 2009, made by a former lab member and circulated among peers.
Whatever concerns any peers might have had: Steffen and Christiane Reinbothe could rely on the “contributed” track at PNAS.

by Leonid Schneider September 11, 2018 61
Academic Publishing Guest post Open Letter

Response to Plan S from Academic Researchers: Unethical, Too Risky!

This is Appeal by several European scientists protesting against Plan S, recently revealed by the EU and a coalition of European research funders. Lynn Kamerlin and her coauthors worry that Plan S will deprive them of quality journal venues and of international collaborative opportunities, while disadvantaging scientists whose research budgets preclude paying and playing in this OA league. They offer instead their own suggestions how to implement Open Science.

by Leonid Schneider August 24, 2018 46
Academic Publishing Research integrity

How Lopez-Otin et al mocked data policy at Nature Cell Biology

Elite journal Nature Cell Biology (NCB) requests deposition of raw data, in particular original scans of western blots and other gel analyses. Spanish star cancer researcher Carlos López-Otín, winner of 2017 Nature Mentoring Award, instead deposited whatever odd gel picture his lab had available, counting that nobody will bother to check. Yet readers did.

by Leonid Schneider August 1, 2018 12
Academic Publishing News Research integrity

Catherine Jessus case: journals hide behind Sorbonne & COPE to avoid retractions

Jaw-dropping corrections issued for the French martyr saint of research integrity, Catherine Jessus, head of biology branch at the French CNRS. All these works of science contained such appalling Photoshop manipulations that the academic publisher had to bend over backwards and hide behind COPE guidelines to invent a reason against retractions.