Re: Underfund peer review?

["Sally Morris \(ALPSP\)" <sally.morris@alpsp.org>]

I think the issue is not about volunteer peer reviewers - it's 
widely held that that's the best and most unbiased way - but in 
using volunteers to carry out all the functions necessary to 
manage the editorial office, including peer review - people who 
may have no training, experience or resources and may be fitting 
it in around a day job

Sally Morris, Chief Executive
Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers
South House, The Street, Clapham, Worthing, West Sussex BN13 3UU, UK
Email:  sally.morris@alpsp.org

----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard Feinman" <RFeinman@downstate.edu>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 11:43 PM
Subject: Underfund peer review?

> "some of these models so underfund peer review or depend on 
> volunteers so heavily that it is unlikely the resources are 
> there to increase the rigor of review,"
>
> I don't have all the figures but i would guess that Nutrition & 
> Metabolism funds peer review at about the same level as all of 
> the ADA publications.  If there is a relation between 
> volunteers vs. payed reviewers in rigor, any unpaid reviewers 
> at ADA would sensibly be unethical especially if there are 
> funds available like, you know, from pharma firms. RF
>
> = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
> Richard D. Feinman,
> Professor of Biochemistry
> (718) 871-1374
> FAX: (718) 270-3316
>
> "Peter Banks" <pbanks@diabetes.org>
> Sent by: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
> 05/15/06 08:56 PM
> RE: Does BMC's business model conflict with Editorial   Independence?
>
> If it were the case that the simple act of taking any money from
> a pharma firm made a researcher "a shill for the corporations,"
> we could believe next to nothing published in journals. Richard
> Smith and Richard Horton like to argue that journals are
> "money-laundering operations for the pharmaceutical industry," a
> clever phrase and soundbite, but an insult to the majority of
> authors and editors who struggle mightily to uphold ethical
> standards.
>
> There are ethical standards for the disclosure of conflicts such
> as those of the International Committee of Medical Journal
> Editors (http://www.icmje.org/#conflicts). Does disclosure fail
> at times? Of course. Eric Topol of the Cleveland Clinic is making
> a career of exposing the failures of disclosure and peer review
> for drugs like Vioxx. Still, the solution is not to throw up
> one's hands and say that everyone is tainted and no one can be
> believed. The solution is to make the peer review and editing
> process even more rigorous for drugs (as with the recent
> requirement for clinical trials to be entered in
> clinicaltrials.gov).
>
> I certainly do not think that editors of OA journals can't in
> theory handle these conflicts as well as other journal editors.
> But they have two additional burdens: 1)  some of these models so
> underfund peer review or depend on volunteers so heavily that it
> is unlikely the resources are there to increase the rigor of
> review, and 2) the editor is put in the position of taking money
> from the sponsor of the paper he must decide to accept or reject.
> The OA system needs its own special set of ethical guidlines,
> which might include an outright ban on pharma advertising, or
> careful mechanisms for separating the editing and funding
> processes.
>
> Peter Banks
> Publisher