The father of Scientometrics died at 91 years old on February 27, 2017 leaving a production of more than 1.000 papers and communications over 60 years of research. … Read More →
SciELO Preprints on the way
The main objective of SciELO Preprints is to speeding up the availability of research results and will contribute to an organized flow of potentially acceptable preprints by SciELO journals, in line with the advances and growing importance of preprints publication internationally. The cooperative construction of the SciELO Preprints modus operandi will encompass the promotion and debate of the preprints concept, the definition of governance and operations structures and the operational implementation. It is expected to be fully operational by mid-2018. … Read More →
Preprints – the way forward for rapid and open knowledge sharing
Preprints – versions of academic articles that have not yet been formally peer-reviewed before publication – are gaining acceptance in the academic world. They deliver open access as well as speedy publication, and their decades old success in physics has spurred on their spread in other disciplines. The development of preprints is accelerating; important funding agencies are in support of them, and also SciELO is planning to set up a preprint server for authors in Latin America and the Global South generally. … Read More →
The BOAI (Budapest Open Access Initiative) celebrates its 15 year anniversary
The Budapest Open Access Initiative is reaching the 15 year anniversary of its publication in February of 2017. As we near this milestone, it is important to take the time to reflect on the values, impact, and continued relevance of the BOAI. We are soliciting your input. The feedback you provide will be used to create updated recommendations to the open access community to help focus our collective efforts to sustain momentum towards achieving the goals of the BOAI. … Read More →
Usage improvements and system’s new features were the main topics of the II SciELO-ScholarOne Updating Course
The II SciELO-ScholarOne Updating Course is a continuity of the SciELO Program’s commitment to raise the level of professionalism of its journals. The event took place at FAPESP’s Auditorium in São Paulo and brought together about 150 representatives of 81 SciELO journals seeking improvement of their editorial managements. … Read More →
Flow of manuscripts and items processed by SciELO Brazil journals in 2014 and 2015
The improvement of manuscripts management is a key dimension in advancing the professionalization of journals promoted by SciELO. In recent years, the manuscript flow of the SciELO Brazil collection includes more than 80,000 submissions and about 20,000 articles published annually. This post looks at this flow in different thematic areas. … Read More →
Theses and dissertations: pros and cons of the traditional and alternative formats
In order to expedite the writing and assessment of theses, institutions and graduate programs in several countries, including Brazil, are choosing to allow candidates who have published papers on their masters or doctorate research topics to replace the thesis chapters by these articles, headed by an introduction, conclusion and review of scientific literature. Is this format ideal and applicable to all? … Read More →
How do researchers and journalists in Brazil relate to each other?
Scientists admit that dealing with complex issues related to their research with journalists is not an easy task. However, long they realized that communicate their results in scientific journals is not enough. To obtain research grants, attract collaboration opportunities and for career advancement, it is necessary – and advisable – to communicate with the public through journalists. Read about the details of this relationship and what can be done to improve it. … Read More →
eBooks – global market and trends – Part III – Final: The publication of printed and digital books in the global context
The e-book Global report shows that the traditional model based on large publishing houses was insufficient to incorporate the possibilities of technological advances. On the one hand, the new reading models through smartphones and subscription platforms and on the other hand, self-publishing of ebooks open opportunities to both individual authors and non-profit organizations in the educational field to produce and distribute their own works at low cost and minimal infrastructure requirements. … Read More →
eBooks – global market and trends – Part II: The publication of printed and digital books in the world context
The Global report on ebooks shows that after several years of growth, commercial companies find a decelerated market, where two lines of action strongly emerge: (a) the digitizing of educational books; and (b) books self-publishing initiatives. In this market stands out the ‘four horsemen’ initiatives that shape the digital ecology, integrated by Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook. … Read More →
eBooks – global market and trends – Part I: Print and digital publication in the global context
In recent years, a global industry of electronic books (ebooks) has emerged, with great force in the English language market and remarkable strength in the United States. There are indicators showing a race between traditional publishing industries and also global players such as Amazon and non-traditional ones, such as authors publishing individually and independently. A recent report published last April, divided into four major sections, presents detailed statistics on the production and market of ebooks from large and medium companies throughout the world, which are the debates and key factors that are shaping the legal and pirate markets, and it also includes a “yellow pages” section, with more than 350 companies dedicated to various services and components in the electronic book chain edition. … Read More →
Zika Fast Track
How can scientific journals assist in the response to Public Health Emergencies? The journal Memórias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz has innovated by creating a fast track for manuscripts submitted on the topic of the Zika Virus. The fast track procedure allows manuscripts to be posted on-line within 24 hours of submission making the data within them available to reader scrutiny and sharing while the manuscripts undergo peer-review. The journal is already reaping some benefits from this approach. … Read More →
The best of both worlds
Quality is an ill-defined concept with regard to scholarly literature. Some aspects of quality can be assessed reasonably objectively, and immediately, such as the quality of presentation. But some cannot be readily determined, and need time and ‘digestion’ by the scholarly community, such as the scientific quality of an article. And then there is the quality of a journal’s service to authors, of particular importance for open access publishing that is supported by Article Processing Charges. Also relevant is the question whether a strong focus on quality and excellence is indeed beneficial to science, or not. I am providing a link to an article on that most interesting topic. … Read More →
Open Access reviewed: stricter criteria preserve credibility
The most comprehensive index of open access journals, the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), reviewed its inclusion criteria, in view of allegations of the presence of predatory journals. This restructuring will lead to more than 3,000 journals to be removed from the database. DOAJ, besides advocating Open Access, established, in collaboration with COPE, OASPA and WAME, a code of principles and good practices in scientific publishing. … Read More →
The search for scientific literature: how readers discover content
What are the sources most used by researchers and other professionals to search and access scholarly literature? A detailed study conducted by experts in publication and management of scientific journals, published in March 2016, aimed to answer this question. Through a survey with over 40,000 readers worldwide, the authors built a broad overview of users’ reading habits, comparing those with results from the last ten years. … Read More →
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