Updated Review of Cabell’s Predatory Journal Blacklist

We've all heard about the market in predatory online open-access journals, with specious review processes, murky editorial boards, and uncertain longevity. But where do you go to determine if a journal publisher (or conference organizer) qualifies as "predatory"? Cabell has for several years offered a scrutiny  and review service, which Rick Anderson revisists and reviews …

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Students’ Reading/Writing: Take Nothing for Granted

Welcome back to the new academic year here in the US. Related to one of faculty members' perennial concerns about college student learning and their abilities as nursing science writers, I want to bring to your attention a growing body of research about college students as readers. First, and if you take nothing else away …

Inside Higher Ed: No More ‘Beall’s List’

Reported today in Inside Higher Ed, librarian Jeffrey Beall's ScholarlyOA website, which had monitored and reported on disturbing instances of predatory online open-access publishing, has been shut down: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/01/18/librarians-list-predatory-journals-reportedly-removed-due-threats-and-politics

“I have a little list”: Beall Expands to Four Lists

For over half a decade librarian Jeffrey Beall has scrutinized on-line open-access publishers and publications, calling out those that he has evaluated as "probably predatory" in his updated list. Subsequently, Beall has developed four lists (which he updates annually): Predatory publishers Predatory stand-alone journals Misleading impact metrics companies Hijacked journals It's time for Beall's annual …

Predatory Publishers Get Attention of Feds

We have reported here frequently in the past concerning the proliferation of predatory online open-access publishing operations, their use of email spam, and their adjunct conference operations. Frequently we've referred readers to Jeffrey Beall's ScholarlyOA Web site. Now in a new twist it's gotten serious: the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has taken notice. As reported …

Shakespeare Anniversary/”Nursing”

Today marks the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, Shakespeare provides us with the earliest attestation of the word nurse as denoting one who provides health care to the sick, which appears in Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors (ca. 1590s): “I will attend my husband, be his nurse, …

ANF 10,000 Nurses on Boards Coalition

Visibility and voice are important themes in the history of nursing. Nursing silence and invisibility doesn't just impair the profession of nursing; it also deprives health professions and society in general from important insights and advocacy. The 10,000 Nurses on Boards Coalition with the American Nurses Foundation is a national initiative to promote, prepare, and …

Post-Publication Peer Review?

A growing number of reports in a variety of media point to problems with pre-publication peer review. Now anonymous group has created a mechanism for post-publication peer review. A wave of the future? They are interviewed here: http://www.vox.com/2015/3/14/8203595/pubpeer (“Why you can’t always believe what you read in scientific journals”). Their web site, PubPeer: The Online …

Scholarly Kitchen: Why Is Science Suffering in the Modern Age?

Kent Anderson writing for the Scholarly Kitchen (“What’s Hot and Cooking in Scholarly Publishing”) asks, “Why is science suffering in the modern age?” Among the causes of the crisis of public confidence in science: Political and societal dysfunction. Economic dysfunction. Mass media dysfunction. Scientific dysfunction. Admitting the complexities of the first three, Anderson observes of …

TIME Person of the Year: Ebola Nurses

The Ebola Nurses: In their own words http://time.com/time-person-of-the-year-ebola-nurses/