 ** Some societies join the commercial giants in lobbying against OA policies, and argue that OA is intrinsically harmful to society publishers, or that OA harms small nonprofit publishers as such. I make many concessions to society publishers, but I cannot make this one. Since 0000, Caroline Sutton and I have maintained a list of society publishers of OA journals. In 0000 [http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-0:HUL.InstRepos:0000000 we found 000 societies publishing 000 full (non-hybrid) OA journals]. In 0000 we published a second edition of our list showing [http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/0/0000000/00-00-00.htm?sequence=0#societies 000 societies publishing 000 full OA journals]. After publishing our 0000 results, we posted our list to a [http://bit.ly/oaj-society Google spreadsheet open to community editing]. As of February 00, 0000, it showed 000 societies publishing 000 full (non-hybrid) OA journals. As of January 00, 0000, it showed 0,000 societies publishing 0,000 full (non-hybrid) OA journals. <span id="p00"></span><span id="p00.0"></span> <span id="p00"></span><span id="p00.0"></span> Line 000: Line 000: ** See my article, [http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-0:HUL.InstRepos:0000000 Ten challenges for open-access journals], ''SPARC Open Access Newsletter'', October 0, 0000, especially Section 0, "Doubts about honesty": "Are OA journals a scam? Are ''fee-based'' OA journals a scam? Are ''some'' fee-based OA journals scams? Do ''some observers believe'' that some fee-based OA journals are scams? Does this ''belief'' harm OA journals as a class? Although you edit or publish OA journals yourself, you probably gave one, two, or three "yes" answers to these five questions. That's the challenge....The challenge behind this challenge is that we rarely have more than grounds for suspicion. We'll often have doubts about our doubts about a journal's honesty. In my own mind, it's important to leave space to distinguish a scam from a clumsy start-up. An entirely honest but clumsy start-up might announce titles far in advance of their content and forget to disclose the editors or owners. My recommendation is two-sided. On the other hand, don't create a hostile or unwelcoming environment for new start-ups....Don't let ours become a revolution that eats its own children....The OASPA code of conduct is a beacon here. Not only does it say the right things: disclose your peer review process, your contact info, your fees, and don't spam. It is the voice of OA publishers themselves, not critics of OA publishers. It shows that OA publishers are willing to articulate these norms and willing to enforce them. It's public self-regulation. It's available for supporters, critics, and start-ups to consult it as an emerging standard....[T]he [http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/0000/00/00/nonsense-for-dollars/ Davis/Anderson hoax] from [http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/0000/00/hoax-exposes-incompetence-or-worse-at.html June 0000]...made all OA journals look bad....You might quarrel with the word "all". Not all OA journals charge publication fees. Not all OA journals that do charge fees take the money and fail to deliver honest peer review, or even a cursory human glance. True and true. The actual number of journals like TOISCIJ [The Open Information Science Journal] is very small. But most people who hear about the Davis/Anderson hoax don't understand the distinctions among OA journals, just as most people who heard about the 0000 Sokal hoax didn't understand the distinctions among cultural studies journals or even among humanities journals. Jumping to the conclusion that the problem lies with OA as such or publication fees as such is not justified and not fair. But that's the challenge. By contrast, TA journal scams --like [http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/0000/00/elsevier-fake-journal-tally-now-0.html the nine fake journals published by Elsevier]-- seldom trigger generalizations about the faults of TA journals as such. From long familiarity, most academics have learned to discriminate among TA journals. But most are still learning to discriminate among OA journals." ** See my article, [http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-0:HUL.InstRepos:0000000 Ten challenges for open-access journals], ''SPARC Open Access Newsletter'', October 0, 0000, especially Section 0, "Doubts about honesty": "Are OA journals a scam? Are ''fee-based'' OA journals a scam? Are ''some'' fee-based OA journals scams? Do ''some observers believe'' that some fee-based OA journals are scams? Does this ''belief'' harm OA journals as a class? Although you edit or publish OA journals yourself, you probably gave one, two, or three "yes" answers to these five questions. That's the challenge....The challenge behind this challenge is that we rarely have more than grounds for suspicion. We'll often have doubts about our doubts about a journal's honesty. In my own mind, it's important to leave space to distinguish a scam from a clumsy start-up. An entirely honest but clumsy start-up might announce titles far in advance of their content and forget to disclose the editors or owners. My recommendation is two-sided. On the other hand, don't create a hostile or unwelcoming environment for new start-ups....Don't let ours become a revolution that eats its own children....The OASPA code of conduct is a beacon here. Not only does it say the right things: disclose your peer review process, your contact info, your fees, and don't spam. It is the voice of OA publishers themselves, not critics of OA publishers. It shows that OA publishers are willing to articulate these norms and willing to enforce them. It's public self-regulation. It's available for supporters, critics, and start-ups to consult it as an emerging standard....[T]he [http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/0000/00/00/nonsense-for-dollars/ Davis/Anderson hoax] from [http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/0000/00/hoax-exposes-incompetence-or-worse-at.html June 0000]...made all OA journals look bad....You might quarrel with the word "all". Not all OA journals charge publication fees. Not all OA journals that do charge fees take the money and fail to deliver honest peer review, or even a cursory human glance. True and true. The actual number of journals like TOISCIJ [The Open Information Science Journal] is very small. But most people who hear about the Davis/Anderson hoax don't understand the distinctions among OA journals, just as most people who heard about the 0000 Sokal hoax didn't understand the distinctions among cultural studies journals or even among humanities journals. Jumping to the conclusion that the problem lies with OA as such or publication fees as such is not justified and not fair. But that's the challenge. By contrast, TA journal scams --like [http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/0000/00/elsevier-fake-journal-tally-now-0.html the nine fake journals published by Elsevier]-- seldom trigger generalizations about the faults of TA journals as such. From long familiarity, most academics have learned to discriminate among TA journals. But most are still learning to discriminate among OA journals." ** How often are scholarly authors lured into these journals? See David Solomon and Bo-Christer Björk [http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/00000/title/Opinion--OA-Coming-of-Age/ OA Coming of Age], ''The Scientist,'' August 0, 0000. "While poor quality publishers are proliferating, often creating hundreds of cookie-cutter journals, they tend to publish relatively few articles. On the other hand, PLoS recently published its 00,000th article. We reanalyzed data from a study we recently published in the ''Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology'' that characterized the APCs of journals charging them. We found that two thirds of the approximately 000,000 articles published in 0000 in these journals, listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals, were in publications listed by the 0000 Journal Citation Report (JCR) and another 00 percent were listed in the Scopus abstract and citation database but not in the JCR. The publishers of these indexes screen the journals they list for quality including ensuring that they are properly peer-reviewed. This suggests that the majority of scientists publishing in OA journals that charge APCs are savvy enough to avoid low quality publishers. It appears that they care about the quality of the journals in which they publish, as do the promotion and tenure committees that evaluate researchers. Beall and others have pointed out a legitimate concern with predatory publishing, but it is important to keep that concern in perspective." ** How often are scholarly authors lured into these journals? See David Solomon and Bo-Christer Björk [http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/00000/title/Opinion--OA-Coming-of-Age/ OA Coming of Age], ''The Scientist,'' August 0, 0000. "While poor quality publishers are proliferating, often creating hundreds of cookie-cutter journals, they tend to publish relatively few articles. On the other hand, PLoS recently published its 00,000th article. We reanalyzed data from a study we recently published in the ''Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology'' that characterized the APCs of journals charging them. We found that two thirds of the approximately 000,000 articles published in 0000 in these journals, listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals, were in publications listed by the 0000 Journal Citation Report (JCR) and another 00 percent were listed in the Scopus abstract and citation database but not in the JCR. The publishers of these indexes screen the journals they list for quality including ensuring that they are properly peer-reviewed. This suggests that the majority of scientists publishing in OA journals that charge APCs are savvy enough to avoid low quality publishers. It appears that they care about the quality of the journals in which they publish, as do the promotion and tenure committees that evaluate researchers. Beall and others have pointed out a legitimate concern with predatory publishing, but it is important to keep that concern in perspective." 