Woodchopper wrote: ↑Fri Aug 20, 2021 8:59 am
Allo V Psycho wrote: ↑Fri Aug 20, 2021 8:16 am
That's... nuts, even the original rule about the candidate's own preprints. I haven't done grant reviewing for a while,only job interviewing but certainly I wouldn't object if candidates for a post listed (a) papers in press (b) papers submitted. In the past I have asked for copies of work submitted, not because I doubted its existence, but because I wanted to assess it and discuss it along with the published work. After all, it is probably the candidate's latest work. The existence of preprints (such as on ResearchSquare) just makes this easier. And it may be the way forward for all scientific publishing.
But to rule out citing someone else's preprints... just, what?
A surprising proportion of my research career has been spent writing unsuccessful grant applications...it is bad enough getting a rejection, without a piece of nonsense like this being involved.
I agree.
I'm vaguely aware that some academics are really upset by what they see as the undermining of the role of peer reviewed journal articles. They worry that if everyone reads and shares the preprints then journals may be less relevant. I assume that some of them are in a senior positions in Australia.
The problem with the old publication model is that the peer-reviewed journals were expensive for libraries, and access was limited to those with a subscription. The problem with the new publication model is that predatory journals will publish any old rubbish and good papers can get swamped, and researchers can't publish at all unless they can raise substantial sums - one very ordinary journal in my field is now charging £2,600 per article, so new researchers are very nearly locked out of publishing at all. The rise of pre-print servers is in part a way of alleviating these problems. A version of the paper (essentially identical except for typesetting) can be published and is free to use, They often also carry a comments facility, so papers can be 'pre-refereed'. So I don't think it is the academic community as a whole that has a problem with pre-prints - universities and some journals are engaging with the idea. I've recently started posting pre-prints too. I still cannot understand why the Australian Research Council is doing this.
Edit: next sentence and the reference.
Also where speed is needed (e.g. Covid papers) preprints are invaluable.
For the rise of preprints, see:
Polka, J. and Penfold, N.C., 2020. Biomedical preprints per month, by source and as a fraction of total literature. [online] Available at: <
https://zenodo.org/record/3819276#.YOteGehKiUk> [Accessed 11 July 2021].