I had no clue that Robert Maxwell began his business career in academic publishing, lol: that explains a lot. We hate them, my Precious, we do.
Why do we – academics, universities, taxpayers – go along with this? This is a complex question, and many things will go into the answer. One part of the answer is that many journals have established their reputations over decades, and academic communities are reluctant to abandon these titles with their established infrastructure and back catalogues. Another part is the difficulty of initiating methods of research publication different from the journal system as it now is. In the TLS of October 27, 2017, Timothy Gowers, Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge – who has been a strong campaigner against the status quo in the world of academic journals – proposed a number of alternatives to the usual peer review structure. The trouble is that significant change requires a level of collective action and cooperation that seems to be beyond academics and universities, now so pitifully competing with one another for everything. ©
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