Dear readers,
I was recently asked to review a paper for what I once thought was a respectable journal, but I had discovered that they actually publish rejected manuscripts online, this making it impossible for authors to improve their manuscript, and submit it to an alternative journal.
Hence. I responded to their request with the following message:
"Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't this the journal that publishes rejected manuscripts thus making it impossible for authors to submit their manuscript elsewhere?
If I am correct, I cannot accept your invitation, as I consider this policy unethical.
Regards,
Hans Lambers"
I wonder what the views of the RG community are. Are you happy to see your manuscripts published online by the journal that rejected your manuscript?
Regards,
Hans Lambers
I can only comment on a journal I am in charge of. We do have a high rejection rate (about 80%), but we also do run a plagiarism check, and papers with a significant overlap with published material will be returned to the authors and rejected.
Dear Prof. Lambers,
I have few queries regarding this:
1) Who rejected the manuscript? Editor or Reviewer?
2) If the Journal rejected the manuscript and then published it, were the authors aware of this? (I mean authors were different not the original ones)
Thanks and Regards,
Kunal
Dear Kunal,
1. Reviewers NEVER reject manuscripts; reviewers provide ADVICE to editors, who then make an editorial decision.
2. The authors were NOT aware of this, but the journal told me they should have been, as that information appears "somewhere"; I believe that is true, but not in a place that is obvious to most authors. The authors then submitted their manuscript to Plant and Soil, where a plagiarism check picked this up. That is when the authors became aware of the issue.
The journal I refer to is considered a reputable journal, but I consider their policy unethical, and told them so.
Regards,
Hans
Thank you Sir for your reply.
I agree with your opinion. This is not good practice of publishing and this may decrease the quality of the journal.
Sir, I have one question.
In most of the cases I saw that journals shows very less percentage of acceptance due to quality policy and submission of large number of papers to journals. But on the same time they publish very common and repeated papers without any plagiarism check. I am always wondering on the Editor's perspective that how they accept such papers.
Would you please throw some light on this?
Regards,
Kunal
I can only comment on a journal I am in charge of. We do have a high rejection rate (about 80%), but we also do run a plagiarism check, and papers with a significant overlap with published material will be returned to the authors and rejected.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Linguistics
- Philology
- Classical Philology
- Manuscripts