Talk:Jeffrey Beall/Archive 1

Archive 1

Criticism

I agree that the Criticism section is poorly sourced and subject to immediate removal per WP:BLP. --Ronz (talk) 17:50, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

Aaand...it's back again. Looks like an edit war. Jinkinson talk to me 18:19, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

I have removed it, deleted it from the page history, and issued a final warning to the user who was adding it back in. This was a clear BLP violation. You can't write a blog attacking a person and then use it as a source for an encyclopedia article, and there is clearly a consensus that it does not belong. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:14, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

More BLP concerns

I blanked a section that seemed no more than an attack on the subject through original research and use of questionable sources including a self-published internet site characterized as a "journal." If there are better sources for this material, let's discuss. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 19:16, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

I restored the material, and changed the wording to make the nature of the material a little clearer. Agreed, Crawford's publication is more of a blog than a journal, but he's universally respected both for his own opinions and the interviews he publishes. BLP is not involved; these are academics discussing an academic issue. DGG ( talk ) 19:59, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

This new section is a pure hit on Beall, starting with an entire paragraph of cherry-picked quotes designed to portray him in as tawdry of a "political" light as possible. And seriously: "universally respected"? "Academics discussing an academic issue"? Beall's work is covered in the New York Times and Science. These people in contrast need to get out of the "Kitchen", if you will, with their petty food fights. It's truly sad to witness the ongoing slide in our quality of sources around here, and disappointing to see you encouraging it, DGG. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 20:12, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with either of these sources but if they are self-published they are unusable per WP:BLPSPS. The expert exception in WP:SPS excludes BLPs. January (talk) 20:16, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Having looked at the about page, Cites and Insights is clearly self-published so I have removed it. January (talk) 20:53, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Cites & Insights is clearly a periodical, ISSN and all, not a blog, but it is indeed also self-published. If that makes it useless as a source, shouldn't the same criterion apply to Beall's lists, which are in fact self-published pages on a blog? (This is Walt Crawford; I have no interest in modifying the entry itself, but find Wikipedia's "some animals are more equal than others" attitude amusing. To clarify: I'm not an academic, and don't actually publish interviews--but the Beall piece was entirely based on cited sources, all of them as "official" as Beall's list.)--walt crawford, who's long since forgotten his Wikipedia account. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 162.224.185.229 (talk) 21:45, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Limited use of Beall's own site in his biography is acceptable per WP:BLPSELFPUB within certain conditions, but use of a self-published source published by someone other than Beall is not acceptable per WP:BLPSPS. Equally Beall's site would be unacceptable as a source in someone else's biography. January (talk) 20:06, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

fringe theory?

so wikipedia is calling lots and lots of publishers predatory based on only one man's opinion? Fgnievinski (talk) 19:34, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

I don't see how you can draw that conclusion from this article. In a biography about Jeffrey Beall, Wikipedia is describing Jeffrey Beall's opinion about open access publishing (the reason for which he is notable). -- Ed (Edgar181) 19:37, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I'm moving the discussion to Talk:Predatory open access publishing#fringe theory?. Fgnievinski (talk) 19:38, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

Neutrality of section "Criticism of open access publishing"

Has any specific objection been raised? Thanks. Fgnievinski (talk) 02:26, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Also, I think the above mentioned section should appear after "Criticism of predatory open access publishing", as the latter is older and more notorious. Fgnievinski (talk) 02:28, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Let me know if there's any outstanding issues, otherwise the POV tag would be removed; let's wait seven days after the initial request for clarification. Thanks. Fgnievinski (talk) 00:01, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

The Micheal Eisen piece is from his own website and is not acceptable per WP:BLPSPS. The expert exception in WP:SPS excludes BLPs. January (talk) 19:35, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Good point; so is Joseph Esposito's piece. That would only leave only Wayne Bivens-Tatum's. I'll delete the offending material. This should settle the NPOV tag. Fgnievinski (talk) 14:44, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Critical of what?

It is true but also misleading to say that Beall is critical of "predatory open access publishing." Just to take the most trivial piece of evidence, his blog is called "Scholarly Open Access" and its tag-line is "Critical analysis of scholarly open-access publishing." The particular form of much of his criticism is to emphasize the extremely bad practices of certain publishers and journals (hence, his coining the term "predatory open access"), but he is very clear that he believes that the open access movement itself facilitates and encourages predatory behavior. Moreover, we (appropriately) have a whole section of the article about his criticisms of open access (not necessarily predatory), and the summary in the lead paragraph should cover this, as well. I therefore propose reversing this edit. --JBL (talk) 20:50, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

• There is some truth to what you write, but the thing is that Beall got known because of the predatory stuff and that is what makes him notable. Without that, his criticisms of OA in general would probably not raise much waves. Perhaps we should look at a different solution, something like "criticisms of OA, especially predatory"? Although that doesn't really reflect what I just wrote either. I think the current lead reflects what makes him notable and other things, like the general criticism are adequately dealt with in the article. --Randykitty (talk) 04:54, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Hi RandyKitty, thanks for your response. Currently, the lead paragraph contains the word "predatory" three times in three sentences, including twice in the sentence in question; I don't think that any reader will be confused about its relative significance in Beall's work. The lead is supposed to summarize the article, and right now I think it's too narrowly focused. Your suggested alternative is reasonable, although I am not sure the sentence will work exactly with that substitution, so it will have to be rewritten a little bit. I will give it a try, and welcome further feedback. --JBL (talk) 16:08, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

By the way, do we have a citation for the fact that he coined the use of "predatory" in this context? None of the citations in the paragraph in question appear to support this (though I don't doubt it). --JBL (talk) 16:12, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Just before I fell asleep last night I had the perfect wording in mind. Of course, I can't remember now... Here's an attempt anyway: "He is a critic of the open access publishing movement and is especially known for his blog, Scholarly Open Access, monitoring "predatory open access publishing", a term he coined." What do you think? The "especially known" makes it clear where his notability comes from, I think, while still mentioning his criticism of OA in general. I don't think we have a quote for his coining of the term. So perhaps we should leave out the "a term he coined" (not really all that important after all). But we should look at the sourcesragain, because it can be in one of them. (No time myself right now, perhaps tomorrow) --Randykitty (talk) 16:19, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Well, it's certainly much better than my effort! I will put it in. About "coined", I just checked the references in the paragraph and didn't see any claim of coinage, although it's sort of suggested by some of the sources (e.g., the Times, "what he calls 'predatory ...'"). --JBL (talk) 16:41, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Controversy with Scielo

Someone should add the controversy with the Brazilian platform [SciELO].179.179.197.55 (talk) 22:22, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

WP:TOOSOON; it has not been covered in multiple reliable sources. See also WP:NEWSEVENT. fgnievinski (talk) 01:49, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

• NEWSEVENT applies to whole articles. We often report stuff based on a single source, as long as it is reliable. Beall's blog is considered a reliable source on academic (especially OA) publishing. We add criticisms voiced by Beall to our articles on publishers, for example, even if not reported elsewhere, too. However, I don't think this is belongs here, but rather in the article on SciELO.--Randykitty (talk) 02:37, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Removal of material

I have removed a large, recently-added section on the SciELO issue which has a significant number of issues related to content policies. We should not title sections in biographies "Controversy" - instead, we should neutrally describe his position and briefly describe the positions of his opponents. The section's length is clearly undue weight on a single issue. Several of the sources are inappropriate, notably a link to a Facebook posting, which is not an acceptable reliable source for criticism of a living person. Please discuss any related proposed addition here before reinserting, as per WP:BRD. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 00:19, 25 October 2015 (UTC)

Currently there are two sections, Redalyc#Controversy and SciELO#Controversy, that are largely overlapping, and speak more of Beall than of Redalyc/SciELO; one way of avoiding content duplication would be to have a single section in the present article. fgnievinski (talk) 14:47, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

Mainly known as "critic of the open access publishing movement" or critic of dubious/predatory publishing practices?

While it is true that Beall seems to be generally critical of open access publishing, the second sentence of this introduction which describes him primarily as "a critic of the open access publishing movement" is misleading, and quite frankly comes across as deflecting from what he is actually known for, which is criticism of predatory/dubious publishing practices, not a general critique of open access publishing. From the perspective of the predatory publishers he criticizes, it is opportune to portray themselves as simply a part of "the open access publishing movement" which is criticized by the "evil anti-open access fanatic Beall;" by using such an obfuscating narrative they try to enlist the support of legitimate and non-predatory publishers by making it seem as if Beall is mainly concerned with criticizing all open access publishers. This is of course highly disingenuous, WP:POV and WP:UNDUE. His somewhat critical views on open access publishing in general is a relatively minor issue and not what he is known for, and there is no indication that his criticism of predatory publishers is aimed at the open access model in general. His views on open access in general could be discussed below, but should not be in the second sentence of the introduction in such a misleading way, even before his criticism of predatory publishers is mentioned. The lead is supposed to summarise what the subject is mainly notable for, with the most notable activities/achievements/issues first, which in his case is his criticism of predatory publishers. --Bjerrebæk (talk) 21:24, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

• I agree completely with Bjerrebæk. The criticism of OA per se would never have made Beall notable, it's a side issue. It's the predatory stuff that he's known for. Presenting it otherwise is playing into the hands of OMICS and friends, the people that actually are subverting the OA movement. --Randykitty (talk) 21:46, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

I strongly disagree: Beall's consistent position is one of criticism of open access publication and the open access movement via a focus on predatory publishing. The two are inextricably linked in all his writings on the subject. The current sentence (whose second half Bjerrebaek's omits above) lays this out in a clear and accurate way. I would be willing to consider rephrasings that reverse the emphasis of the sentence, but the actual edit Bjerrebaek made (and I reverted) was not acceptable: it was redundant and completely lost the breadth of Beall's criticism. --JBL (talk) 01:13, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Further: the sentence in the lead currently does a good job summarizing the body; any revisions should respect that role. Also, for reference, this discussion is really an extension of #Critical of what? above, where we arrived at the current wording. --JBL (talk) 01:18, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

No, it doesn't, the sentence is horribly worded and misrepresents what he is known for, and tendentiously links what he is actually known for with his allegedly critical views on open access publishing, while also portraying the latter as the more important by mentioning it first. His views on open access publishing in general shouldn't even be in the introduction. Reliable sources focus more or less exclusively on his criticism of predatory publishing through his blog. His views on open access publishing on the other hand boil down to a few comments which are not notable by themselves, which would never earn him a Wikipedia biography, and which have been ignored by reliable sources (as opposed to his systematic work on predatory publishing on his blog and in other publications, and which have been reported extensively on and discussed in RS). --Bjerrebæk (talk) 01:38, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

You are repeating yourself tediously and unconstructively; your comments are unresponsive to anything anyone has written, and don't deal with the various reasons your edits have been bad, nor propose alternatives. Rather than repeating the various comments made above, I ask that you try to engage thoughtfully and constructively with them. --JBL (talk) 13:10, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

I will repeat one comment from the earlier discussion: go read the title and tag line of Beall's blog -- what does he think his blog is about? --JBL (talk) 13:19, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Sure, that's the tile of his blog. However, if all he'd ever done would have been to criticize OA, we wouldn't be having this discussion, because he wouldn't be notable. What has put him in the limelight is his criticism of predatory OA. --Randykitty (talk) 15:11, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Since you wrote the sentence in question, perhaps you could review the earlier discussion and explain what has changed. --JBL (talk) 16:43, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Sjeez, forgot all about that. Yes, I did, didn't I? I guess what has changed is Bjerrebæk's arguments which I find persuasive. The criticism of OA must of course stay in the article, but I think it's undue in the lead. --Randykitty (talk) 17:04, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

User:Joel B. Lewis, you are the one whose edits have been bad. Your idea that we should interpret what Beall's blog is "really about" is a suggestion that we should engage in original research. Wikipedia is based on reliable sources. According to reliable sources, Beall is notable for his criticism of predatory/dubious publishing practices, and for coining the now widely used (or at least discussed) term predatory publishing. What is really wrong with the sentence, is

1. that it mentions criticism of "the open access publishing movement" first in the second sentence, before mentioning what he is actually notable for, despite the fact that his critical views on access publishing in general are completely unremarkable and not something he is notable for
2. that it mentions his blog and criticism of predatory publishers only in the context of the latter, in the same sentence, which constitutes an improper synthesis by suggesting his criticism of predadory publishing is really about being against "the open access publishing movement"
3. that the description "the open access publishing movement" in this context itself is biased by seemingly including every single dubious and predatory publisher he criticizes for their dubious and predatory publishing practices (not for being open access in itself) in this supposed "movement". This plays right into the hands of those who want to hijack the term "open access."

--Bjerrebæk (talk) 18:25, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Bjerrerbaek, you continue to repeat yourself tiresomely and unconstructively.

Randykitty, what Beall does is criticism (in both the scholarly and colloquial senses) of the open access movement. The form of his criticism is the cataloging of predatory behavior. The current sentence does a good job of mentioning both the broader area and the specific method. (It also reflects the body of the article.) As I said, rewriting the sentence in question in a thoughtful way with different emphasis could be fine, but so far no one has made an acceptable suggestion. If you propose alternatives I would be happy to consider them. --JBL (talk) 18:42, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

That's incorrect. If it were, then Beall would argue that every OA publisher/journal is predatory and that's not what he does. Far as I can see, he started with criticizing predatory publishers and then later became disillusioned with OA as a whole. Nevertheless, even now he only from time to time criticizes OA per se and most of the time stays with exposing predatory practices. And there has hardly been any secondary coverage of his OA criticisms, but lots of secondary coverage of his exposing predatory stuff. --Randykitty (talk) 18:58, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

I took a stab at better describing the tripleC piece. His criticism there is really about what advocates for OA say and do, not about OA per se. He sees what he calls the "gold standard" OA model to be especially prone to abuse and seems to see the "platinum standard" model as better. Jytdog (talk) 19:17, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Nothing I wrote has as an implication that Beall would or should find all open access publications to be predatory, just as movie critics do not have to dislike every movie they watch. The form of Beall's criticism is cataloging predatory behavior, but the subject of his criticism is the open access model of publishing.

Thank you Jytdog for trying to move the conversation to be about the actual article. I have one comment, which is that the phrase "their black-and-white worldview" is in WP's voice, and I am skeptical that we should be making such an evaluation. -JBL (talk) 19:58, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

you are welcome. "black and white" is a paraphase of Beall's use of "manichean" - it is directly supported by that and other things he says about the polarized discourse of advocates/zealots. This is a central point of his tripleC piece, in my view, and it really should go back in.... Jytdog (talk) 20:07, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't object to putting "black and white" back in if it's clear that the characterization is Beall's view (not WP's). --JBL (talk) 20:11, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

User:Joel B. Lewis, until now you not contributed with anything of substance in this discussion, or presented any arguments against the arguments presented here, or any arguments in favour of mentioning his criticism of open access before his criticism of predatory publishing. I'm starting to see a consensus to change the wording to a wording that emphasizes his criticism of predatory publishing instead of his supposed criticism of open access. Beall, as it happens, was initially not opposed to open access itself, as he wrote in a review some years ago: "The Open Access model is a good one, for it makes research freely available to everyone. However, Bentham Open is exploiting the good will of those who established the Open Access model by twisting it and exploiting it for profit. Just because a journal is Open Access doesn’t make it legitimate or high quality." In the years after that, he has sometimes made a few comments that seem critical of open access in general, but it is ridiculous to portray those comments as the main issue in the lead section. --Bjerrebæk (talk) 19:20, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

There cannot be a consensus developing around particular wording because no one has proposed any. I have invited such proposals several times; why don't you make one? --JBL (talk) 20:04, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Separately: movie critics are not people who object to movies. Criticism of open access publishing is not synonymous with opposition to all open access publishing. If that's all this is about I wish someone had said so sooner. --JBL (talk) 20:07, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Wrong. --Bjerrebæk (talk) 20:48, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

That edit is best-known for its redundancy, and is especially known for repeating itself. --JBL (talk) 20:57, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

I realise that you are best known for your use of high-quality humour on Wikipedia talk pages, but nevertheless, a particular wording has indeed been proposed, and there seems to be a general agreement among everyone else that the lead section should emphasize his criticism of predatory publishing practices instead of mentioning criticism of "the open access publishing movement" first. --Bjerrebæk (talk) 09:39, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

OMICS lawsuit

I made an addition about the Federal Trade Commission lawsuit against OMICS. This has been reverted as SYNTH, but I think the suit is relevant. I have located other references so I propose the following addition, either as a one or two paragraphs at the end of the Legal threats section. Text in green is new, as is ref 1, black is in the article at present:

In May 2013, OMICS Publishing Group, which had also been included on Beall's list of predatory open access publishers, issued a warning to Beall in a poorly-written letter stating that they intended to sue him, and were seeking $1 billion in damages under section 66A of India's Information Technology Act, 2000. However, section 66A was struck down as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of India in an unrelated case in 2015. In 2016, Beall welcomed news that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission had filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court against the OMICS group. The complaint is the first against an academic publisher and alleges that the defendants have been "deceiving academics and researchers about the nature of its publications and hiding publication fees ranging from hundreds to thousands of dollars," holding manuscripts hostage by seeking fees to allow them to be withdrawn, and promoting predatory conferences; Inside Higher Education reports that Beall has published examples of these sorts of activities by OMICS, and he has previously said of the organistion: "If anything is predatory, it's that publisher. It's the worst of the worst." OMICS' attorneys have described the allegations as baseless.

References

There is also a BMJ source at doi:10.1136/bmj.i4917 titled "US Federal Trade Commission charges academic publisher over 'deceptive' practices" which I haven't read but which might be useful. @Randykitty and Joel B. Lewis: You have both commented to me about these issues, so I invite your thoughts / input. Refs talking about the case almost inevitably mention Beall, and he has welcomed the lawsuit and is an expert in the field; I accept that what I did before was seen as SYNTH, but I think it is that I am not showing the connection seen in the references clearly. The Inside Higher Education reference makes an explicit comparison between what Beall has published and the allegations in the lawsuit, and both it and iThenticate quote Beall's description of OMICS in their reporting. Hence, I think (some) mention is relevant here, but will of course abide by consensus. Also inviting perspectives of Everymorning, Fgnievinski, DGG, and Jytdog as recently-active editors who have made substantial change to this article, according to the revision history statistics. Thoughts, comments, suggestions, criticisms, etc all welcome. Thanks. EdChem (talk) 00:38, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

I have no objection to the proposed content, especially as they threatened to sue him. seems relevant and plenty well sourced. Jytdog (talk) 00:51, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

ditto DGG ( talk ) 00:53, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Jytdog and DGG. Made a small addition on the holding of manuscripts hostage. EdChem (talk) 01:22, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

• I think this takes care of the SYNTH issue, thanks! --Randykitty (talk) 09:13, 2 November 2016 (UTC)
  • Thanks, change made.  :) EdChem (talk) 12:17, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

scholarlyoa is down - what gives?

Is he quitting or relocating?137.205.101.122 (talk) 11:42, 17 January 2017 (UTC)

I think this is worth including but only after it's covered by reliable sources. The website is down which is trivially verifiable, but there's no explanation, and right now it's just speculation. Banedon (talk) 14:09, 17 January 2017 (UTC)

Included based on a Science News article. http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/01/mystery-controversial-list-predatory-publishers-disappears. GoEThe (talk) 08:50, 18 January 2017 (UTC)

The shutdown has also been covered in Nature News and Comment. Dahliarose (talk) 13:32, 18 January 2017 (UTC)

And Inside Higher Education [1]. Everymorning (talk) 13:48, 18 January 2017 (UTC)

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Major Reasons to Close Beal's List

<copyvio redacted> Please feel free to discuss here. Jai22 (talk) 05:36, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

I've reverted for the time being; I think this needs some discussion.

a) Is this a number of assertions by some Chronicle journalist, or are there further sources? It's paywalled so I can't check. In the former case, some less assertive phrasing would presumably be required.

b) In either case, a suitable format would be a little more condensed, not a blow-by-blow account.

( c) And in any case this needs some rephrasing, grammar and spell-checking) --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 08:21, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

• This link provides access to the article. --Randykitty (talk) 09:01, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

Thank you. - If people are happy with the sourcing (the Chronicle usually having good chops there), I'd suggest inserting a single sentence into the "Website removal" section, after " [...] which threatened his job security." - e.g. : "A demand by Frontiers Media to open a research misconduct case against Beall, to which the University of Colorado acquiesced, is reported as the immediate reason for Beall to take down the list." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Elmidae (talk • contribs)

• To do justice to Beall, it should be added that he was cleared at the conclusion of the case. This really is (yet another) black mark on Frontiers... --Randykitty (talk) 10:46, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

Major reasons to close Beal's list should be added as it is a key to the wording "predatory publishing" Mr. Frederick Fenter of Frontiers Media played a key role to close the Beal's list. Mr. Fenter travelled from Switzerland to University of Colorado and accused the University. After continued pressure from Frontiers, University of Colorado initiated action against Mr. Jeffrey Beall, finally Beall responded and closed the list. Jai22 (talk) 17:00, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

Actually, those are not "reasons", they are "causes". Using the word "reasons" implies that the removal was reasonable, when it actually was nothing but strong-arming by powerful companies. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:33, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

I really think it's quite beyond our scope to recount who travelled from where to where to do what. Frontiers applied pressure, Colorado folded, and Beall closed down the list. That's all we should be reporting here (and the source is there for whoever wants to know more). --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 12:04, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

Sheesh, the COIs are flying low today... I now added the following: A demand by Frontiers Media to open a research misconduct case against Beall, to which the University of Colorado acquiesced, is reported as the immediate reason for Beall to take down the list. The university's investigation was closed with no findings. How's that? - Too bad the "official" link is walled, but I suppose it would not be appropriate to provide the keyed URl provided above :p --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 07:14, 15 September 2017 (UTC)