Academia Should Stop Using Beall’s Lists and Review Their Use in Previous Studies

Abstract

Academics (should) strive to submit to journals which are academically sound and scholarly. To achieve this, they could either submit to journals that appear exclusively on safelists (occasionally referred to as whitelists, although this term tends to be avoided), or avoid submitting to journals on watchlists (occasionally referred to as blacklists, although this term tends to be avoided). The most well-known of these lists was curated by Jeffrey Beall. Beall’s Lists (there are two, one for stand-alone journals and one for publishers) were taken offline by Beall himself in January 2017. Prior to 2017, Beall’s Lists were widely cited and utilized, including to make quantitative claims about scholarly publishing. Even after Beall’s Lists became obsolete (they have not been maintained for the past six years), they continue to be widely cited and used. This paper argues that the use of Beall’s Lists, pre- and post-2017, may constitute a methodological error and, even if papers carry a disclaimer or limitations section noting this weakness, their conclusions cannot always be relied upon. This paper also argues for the need to conduct a detailed post-publication assessment of reports in the literature that used Beall’s Lists to validate their findings and conclusions, assuming that it becomes accepted that Beall’s Lists are not a reliable resource for scientific investigation. Finally, this paper contends that any papers that have identified methodological errors should be corrected. Several lists that were cloned from Beall’s Lists have also emerged and are also being cited. These should also be included in any post-publication investigation that is conducted.

Risks of abuse of large language models, like ChatGPT, in scientific publishing: Authorship, predatory publishing, and paper mills

“…The identification and/or classification of a predatory journal or publisher is a challenging task that is currently not effectively being achieved by the scientific community. Beall's lists (Beall, 2017; Kendall, 2021) were popular ‘go‐to’ resources, but since Beall shut down the blog that housed them in 2017, they are now redundant, outdated, and thus of little academic use, and their use in some academic papers may invalidate their methodology and findings (Teixeira da Silva & Kendall, 2023a). Moreover, an AI‐driven software that also claims to effectively discern ‘normal’ from ‘suspected predatory’ journals also currently gives an apparently high false positive output, and thus the serious problem of journal misclassification, which can severely damage their reputations if characterizations are not accurate, or substantiated (Teixeira da Silva & Kendall, 2023b).…”

A reflection on Springer Nature’s current editorial policies related to “predatory” journals and references

“…2023;8. https://doi.org/10.24069/ SEP- 2023;8 на существующие опасения, что «черные списки» Билла могут быть использованы и во вред -например, в качестве инструмента в руках ученых, конкурирующих между собой [4] -они продолжают функционировать как источник рекомендаций, в каких журналах публиковаться небезопасно. Тем не менее, в наши дни не принято считать этот источник надежным, поскольку блог Билла давно не обновлялся и содержит множество устаревшей и просто ошибочной информации [5]. Наоборот, внимание следует обращать на «белые» или «безопасные» списки, в которых представлены научные журналы или издатели, которые, по всей видимости, следуют этическому кодексу о научных публикациях [6].…”

“…Объектом внимания настоящей статьи является редакционная политика Springer Nature (рис. 1 5 ; Springer Nature, 2023) в отношении ««хищнических» журналов и ссылок на публикации в таких журналах» (Predatory Journals and References Editorial Policies, далее по тексту -PJREP). Компания Springer Nature использует кавычки при упоминании явления «хищничества» в основном тексте руководства, но не использует их в названии, что вызывает путаницу относительно того, известны ли такие журналы доподлинно или нет.…”