Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Date of this Version
Summer 4-29-2021
Abstract
The substandard, low quality or predatory journals are the real threat to the publishing industry. It is a challenge to the quality and ethics of publication. The problem grabs the attention of scholarly community when the publisher of an open access journal Gunther Eysenbach, identified a black sheep among open access publishers and journals, since then many experiments were conducted to identify the black sheep and guidelines were issued to avoid them. However, the most substantial work in the field of predatory publishing was performed by Jeffery Beall who came up with a blacklist of predatory OA publishers and journal. For several years since the publishing of the Beall’s list, there has been increasing concerns about the criteria that Beall used to develop his lists, with some scholars dismissing his lists as inaccurate, misleading and dangerous to academics. The paper is a discourse on the 56 characteristics list by Beall as guidelines for Determining Predatory Open-Access Publishers and journals with a focusing on the factors which can be considered as Irrational Factors for labeling a journal as predatory. The irrational factor included in his criteria could be a strong reason for dismissal of the list and the criteria by the experts worldwide.