is Sexxing up your scientific journal OK? The Journal of Proteomics seems to think so

I saw a Tweet from a college classmate of mine -  Jillian Buriak - that pointed me to this article from the Journal of Proteomics in January 2012.

Harry Belafonte and the secret proteome of coconut milk

And this is what one sees when one goes there:

A "Graphical Abstract" with the text "Here is your coconut woman, as perhaps envisioned by Harry Belafonte. For its proteome, though, have a look at the report inside!".  I guess this is an attempt at a joke about breasts and coconuts?  And how is it appropriate for a scientific paper?

Want to guess about the gender balance of the people who run the journal? Here are the pics from the web site of the main executive editors and officials

And now Spam from Elsevier - thanks - but no thanks

Just got an email from Elsevier for something called "Reviewers' Update" which starts off:

Dear Dr Eisen,

As a valued contributor to Elsevier's journals we thought you may be interested in receiving the Reviewers' Update - our free quarterly e-update for reviewers - which contains advice for reviewers, updates on how Elsevier supports the peer review process as well as information which we hope proves useful to you when reviewing manuscripts.

Click on the headings below for access to a selection of articles in Issues 8 and 9, or browse through the full archive on the Reviewers' Update homepage.

Would you like to receive the next issue of Reviewers' Update as well as future reviewer updates?

If so, please register here.

Kind regards,

Andrea Hoogenkamp-O'Brien, PhD
Communications Manager, Elsevier

That leads me to wonder - just what did I do to become a valued contributor?  I cannot for the life of me remember the last time I reviewed for any Elsevier journal.   And the last time I was an author on a paper in an Elsevier journal was 2006 and that was only because I did not really realize that is where collaborators were submitting a paper.  Thanks Elsevier, but I will skip registering for this service.

Q & A about Elsevier, my blog retraction, and #OpenAccess

Jop de Vrieze has written an article related to the Elsevier boycott for ScienceInsider:

Thousands of Scientists Vow to Boycott Elsevier to Protest Journal Prices

In the article, one of the things he discusses is my blog post (which I then "retracted) suggesting people ignore any papers published in Elsevier Journals: Boycotting Elsevier is not enough - time to make them invisible (UPDATED/RETRACTED).

In his article he wrote:

One scientist who strongly supports the boycott is Jonathan Eisen, a microbial genomicist at the University of California, Davis, and the Academic Editor-in-Chief of PLoS Biology, an open access journal. On Tuesday, Eisen urged readers of his blog to go one step further, by no longer paying attention to research published by Elsevier. "In essence, ignore them - consider them dead - make them invisible," he wrote. But after readers protested that no paper should be ignored just because of where it's published, Eisen quickly retracted the entire post, which he said had been written "at midnight, with a cat on my lap." "The response to my post helped make me realize that the semi-sarcastic attempted tone was not coming through correctly," Eisen writes in an e-mail to ScienceInsider.

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de Vrieze did a good job of representing my point of view.  But I thought it might be useful to all of the Q&A in the email with him.  Fortunately, he said this was OK to do so ... here are my full answers to his questions:

Boycotting Elsevier is not enough - time to make them invisible (UPDATED/RETRACTED)

Update: The original post here was written at midnight, with a cat on my lap.  I thought this post conveyed some tongue in cheek aspect of this idea to ignore work in Elsevier journals. (one could view it as a midnight middle finger to Elsevier over some of their policies).  But clearly, based on the responses I am seeing that did not come across.  I accept the error of my ways.  Drug Monkey is right - no work should be ignored - no matter where it is published.   I could explain in more detail what I was trying to convey - but in the end that is like explaining a bad joke.  Instead, I am therefore retracting my blog post.  That is one for Ivan Oransky I guess. Now back to your regularly scheduled programs.

There has been much written in the last few days about multiple calls to boycott journals published by Elsevier due to Elsevier's generally problematic publishing policies and support of SOPA/ RWA, etc.  People have called for people to not only boycott publishing in Elsevier journals but to also stop reviewing for them, editing for them, and also to try to get libraries to stop subscribing to them.  Some good reading in this area includes:

• Mathematicians boycott Elsevier publishing
• The Cost of Knowledge
• Elsevier - my part in its downfall
• Journal Publishing Reform
• Ban Elsevier
• Scientists organize Elsevier boycott
• Academic publishers have become the enemies of science

I think these are good steps.  But I also think they are not enough.  I am therefore calling for people to go one step further - to stop helping promote articles published in Elsevier journals.  Don't blog about papers in Elsevier journals.  Don't tweet about them.  Don't use Elsevier papers for journal clubs.  In essence, ignore them - consider them dead - make them invisible.  Not completely of course.  Any work should be considered a contribution to science or math or whatever your field is.  But there are LOTS and LOTS of things to do with your time.  And if you like to share - to communicate - to discuss - it is easy to find non Elsevier articles articles for those purposes (even better - pick open access articles ..)

This may be a minor thing in the fight for more openness in publishing, but it should help.  After all, for many scientists, the worst thing that can happen is to be ignored.