Dear Prof Abhijit, while researchers on RG may be so conscious about IF, I wasn't so aware about it, until I joined RG.  Perhaps I'm not the only one.  So I asked 3 senior researchers about it.  One of them told me that publishing was more important, another said IF is not the primary concern.  And the third person said, 'The story of (IF) has been invented by some influential businesses to beat the competitors. I think it is more proper to accept publishing anywhere provided that the journal has decent reputation (even though low IF).'  

I think I got good advice, do you agree?  As for those who don't do research, they see our desire to gain knowledge from research is fine, but it's just not their cup of tea.  Thanks.

The common people particularly the farmers, fisherman or a seller are least impacted of impact factor. I believe that they have not even heard of the term. It is just a craze in the scientific world and no conveyer belt has been developed so far to reach the real impact of impact factor to the common people.

Dear Prof Abhijit, while researchers on RG may be so conscious about IF, I wasn't so aware about it, until I joined RG.  Perhaps I'm not the only one.  So I asked 3 senior researchers about it.  One of them told me that publishing was more important, another said IF is not the primary concern.  And the third person said, 'The story of (IF) has been invented by some influential businesses to beat the competitors. I think it is more proper to accept publishing anywhere provided that the journal has decent reputation (even though low IF).'  

I think I got good advice, do you agree?  As for those who don't do research, they see our desire to gain knowledge from research is fine, but it's just not their cup of tea.  Thanks.

First of all, I agree that Science is for the people, by the people and beat the people.  As for the impact factor of journals, the following explains its nature.

Journal Citation Reports (JCR) is an annual publication by the Science and Scholarly Research division of Thomson Reuters. It has been integrated with the Web of Science and is accessed from the Web of Science-Core Collections. It provides information about academic journals in the sciences and social sciences, including impact factors. The JCR was originally published as a part of Science Citation Index.

For more information, we may refer to the following link regarding the subject.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journal_Citation_Reports

To my understanding science should not be limited to Journals. Cognizant with history of journals and publishing I appreciate the structured way of information/ knowledge communication (mainly to and with peers) it was meant to develop and it did so very efficaciously. Nevertheless, it is pertinent the science and scientific findings also find alternate routes of dispersion and dissemination, for the better good of an informed society and responsible global citizens.

Friends, I think that farmers, fishermen, fish mongers, fruit sellers are all CONCERNED ABOUT IMPACT of our research.  Does it improve water quality?  Does it desalinate water, and make it useful?  They are not so concerned about impact factor.  ARE WE TO BE MORE CONCERNED ABOUT WHAT WE DO FOR OUR PEOPLE, FOR THEIR LIVES AND WELL BEING, OR FOR 'STATUS' AND IF?

See this link, about IF distortions: 'The misuse of the journal impact factor is highly destructive, inviting a gaming of the metric that can bias journals against publishing important papers in fields (such as social sciences and ecology) that are much less cited than others (such as biomedicine). 

I am very much new to this publication business.. I do not have much idea on importance of IF. My professors before they look for publication, they always check IF of the journal.

Personally, I think IF is not much important, if your paper or your work is excellent everybody will try to check your paper and refer.

Dear @Abhijit, many journals were banned for boosting impact factor with self-citations, or for some other reasons. Dissemination of knowledge and access to as many readers is the real goal, not just IF itself!

http://blogs.nature.com/news/2013/06/new-record-66-journals-banned-for-boosting-impact-factor-with-self-citations.html

For the followers of this thread, it is important to see some good answers on 350 threads posted under topic Journal Impact factor!

https://www.researchgate.net/topic/journal_impact_factor

http://www.jifactor.com/