Scholars Test Web Alternative to Peer Review
F or professors, publishing in elite journals is an unavoidable part of university life. The grueling process of subjecting work to the up-or-down judgment of credentialed scholarly peers has been a cornerstone of academic culture since at least the mid-20th century. Blog ArtsBeat The latest on the arts, coverage of live events, critical reviews, multimedia extravaganzas and much more. Join the discussion. More Arts News Now some humanities scholars have begun to challenge the monopoly that peer review has on admission to career-making journals and, as a consequence, to the charmed circle of tenured academe. They argue that in an era of digital media there is a better way to assess the quality of work. Instead of relying on a few experts selected by leading...
Rethinking Peer Review As The World Peer Reviews Claimed Proof That P≠NP
W e recently discussed how incredibly broken the traditional scientific journal system is, in terms of how they tend to lock up access to information. However, that left out a much bigger concern: the peer review system they use doesn’t always work very well. There is, of course, the famous case of Hendrik Schön, who was the toast of the physics world, until it was discovered that his “breakthroughs” were frauds — even though they were peer reviewed. But that, of course, is an extreme case. Even outside of that, though, peer review has always been somewhat questionable, and many have warned in the past that it’s not particularly reliable or consistent in judging the quality of research. This week, the world has been taken by storm...
Academic Journals Seeing Benefits In More Open Peer Review
W e recently discussed the idea of much more open, online-based peer review processes. In the ensuing discussion some claimed that such things might work for subject areas like math, where concepts could be reviewed and tested by others, but might not work as well in other areas. However, a recent experiment by the Shakespeare Quarterly to experiment with a more open, online peer review system apparently worked quite nicely: Mixing traditional and new methods, the journal posted online four essays not yet accepted for publication, and a core group of experts — what Ms. Rowe called “our crowd sourcing” — were invited to post their signed comments on the Web site MediaCommons, a scholarly digital network. Others could add their thoughts as...
The economic case for open access in academic publishing
A s hyperbolic as it may sound, academic publishing is the curator and guardian of the accumulated scientific knowledge of the human race, 1600 to present. It is also a cornerstone of modern science, preferentially selecting well-executed research through the peer review process. However, academic libraries are facing decreasing budgets, and even highly ranked universities are having to cut back on journal subscriptions. Since these subscriptions account for up to 75 percent of publishers’ revenues, the entire system is feeling the pressure of the economic crisis. But that’s not the only source of strain. As content migrates to the Web and becomes increasingly difficult to control, the “walled garden” subscription business model used by the...
Welcome to FARA Week
W elcome to the Free Academic Research Association Week, where we hope to spread the word about releasing academic research on the web. It is our goal to encourage the world’s leading academics to publish online, preserving the integrity of the educational and academic arenas from corporate interests while, at the same time, spreading information as widely and freely as possible. Whether you are at Harvard, a community college, or in online degree programs, you should be able to publish your work online.