An academic recently wrote a question, and I went to answer it, but it appears he deleted his question (probably out of embarrassment).
It concerned what I call "Vampire" publishers. This academic paid some money to an Indian journal but they had "not received" his money and he was wondering whether he should be worried. That was his question.
These "publishers" are becoming a problem. The academic need not have been embarrassed as forums like these are a good way to expose them. So I will raise the question again for comment.
I am not asking so much if people have been conned by these malicious "journals", but I am asking if you have been approached by them. I am interested in ascertaining the magnitude of the problem. I am also trying to expose these practices in a public forum for younger scholars.
My response is given below.
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"Vampire" publishers are now rife. They send you a nice email explaining how they have read your paper X, and they flatter you by saying how they respect your expertise in area Y. Then they offer to publish a piece of yours in return for a small fee.
No journal worth its salt will ask for money. Journals that do are not worth your attention. Being published in them will add nothing to your CV.
It sounds like you have been conned. This is the academic equivalent of the "Nigerian letter" scam. If your work appears at all (and I doubt it) it won't be recognised as a legitimate publication by real scholars. Their impact factor was probably made up just to impress and to get you in.
While top-ranked journals are annoying in their insouciant attitude, and take forever to publish your work (if they ever do); and they have endlessly long peer-review processes, they are the only ones to aim for.
Put it down to experience. Good luck.
What is "well known" to some is not known at all to others Artur, so it is worth raising.
I think that there is two separate issue here. There are the imitations or simulacra of scholarly journals (as Artur have said, this is already a well-known issue under the label "predatory publishers") and legit new OA journals with real peer review & scientific editing, which apart from contributing to scientific development wish to earn some money (be it as little as barely covering their publishing costs or as much as you can imagine). While it is utterly wrong to associate oneself in any way with predatory journals, it is not unwise to pay for OA and dissemination of your work. Here, you do not pay to the publisher for publishing your work quickly and without real peer evaluation, but for publishing your scientifically accredited work in a certain way, incorporating the possibility of being read and cited by more ppl than in the case of a traditional print-and-paper publication.
yes, there seems an endless number of 'journals' which have sent me submission invitations, some using the technique you mention (i.e. linked to a published work) - but others without this and often in fields / areas quite separate from my field of expertise! when you read through the e-mail the 'hidden' fee becomes apparent. I have also received a lot of e-mails in a similar vein inviting me to present at conferences, which are not clearly credible, and also invitations to act as a peer reviewer for some of the open access type publications. I was happy to do the peer review for one journal, but with the second I found when looking up an earlier edition of the journal that the quality of previously published work was very poor. I think this is in part the key - at a minimum see if you can access the journal site and check the material they have published. It is difficult - while the open access concept is admirable, it is also misused at times to present works that have little credibility and which appear to have been published purely to generate the fee paid
These responses are interesting. It seems there are discipline-specific variations on this. For some disciplines--in the sciences--it is apparently OK to pay to get a paper published. I have no reason to doubt it.
In my discipline areas this would never do. An academic would have to have rocks in their head, or be ignorant/uninformed, or desperate, to do this. As far as I know there is no such thing as a 'legitimate' Educational or Philosophical journal -- OA or otherwise-- that, as a condition of publication, asks for money.
Why are there these variations? Is there too much competition for publication in the sciences, and therefore they can charge? Or perhaps there are too few journals in the field given the number of scientists (this hardly seems believable)?
The situation is more variable than I initially thought.
Martin,
There are some bad journals out there! The best way to select is to ask around with colleagues you respect. Submit your work to journals that has published 10 or more volumes. Check to see it the journal's published articles are being cited frequently in the literature. There are some very good for-profit publishers that publish good quality articles.
However, very good journals often charge page fees and review fees. In the finance and accounting areas several journals are charging as much as $250 in U.S. currency just to review an article. These fees are often non-refundable.
Moreover, you should share this question with your network.
This might be of interest: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/342/6154/60.full
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