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WordPress blogs solve problems of peer review expert publications

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September 1, 2014

Whether it’s science, medicine, law, or technology, publishing is by and large a peer review model controlled by large publishers and organizations.

With the Internet and WordPress democratizing publishing, why can’t we have an open publishing system driven by blogs? It would benefit experts and society at large.

From technology executive, Daniel Marovitz (@marovdan), in TechCrunch:

Scientific, Technical, and Medical (STM) publishing is big business. It generates $19 billion in revenue per year, the majority of which is earned by a few powerful publishers that enjoy profit margins of up to 40 percent. Inflated subscriptions sold to academic libraries keep them moving ahead because the librarians feel they have no choice but to buy. These companies add little value to the actual publishing product but they are entrenched.

The problem with this model is that major breakthroughs in medicine and science that could save lives languish in articles which are systematically delayed year after year. In the case of medicine, developments which could save lives. Crazier yet is that the research and work going into these articles is taxpayer funded.

Though some publications have moved to digital, it’s merely an outdated print model with the same problems.

Look at the problems cited by Marovitz and how they could be answered through blogging.

Delay. It takes months, even years, for research and ideas to get published. Part of the delay comes in publishers rejecting articles which then never see the light of day for other experts to build on.

Years of research and collaboration is buried because of gatekeepers, disguised as peer reviewers, who may not like an article or study. And why should experts have to spend so much time trying to get peer review and to get published? Shouldn’t they spend their time ‘being experts’ and openly advancing ideas.

Why not provide these experts RSS feeds of relevant information and insight? Why not empower these experts to publish as they develop ideas on a WordPress blog publishing platform?

Better yet, hook these experts into a blog network where when they reference another expert in the network or tags on the network, others see it ala Facebook.

I say WordPress as it’s already powering over 23% of the websites of the world. An open and widely used platform with systems and databases that can be built on and integrated over time is critical.

Anonymity. Peer reviewers know who wrote the article and did the research, but the publishers do not know who is doing the peer review.

Not only does this pose all sorts of ethical and conflicts problems, but there is no open feedback everyone can benefit from, including the publishers.

While technology is going open source for the benefit of us all, expert publications can be held back by competitors masking as peer reviewers. Maybe a publisher sees economic risks in publishing an article – such as large institutions withdrawing their subscriptions.

Blogs advance ideas because of the immediate feedback from other thought leaders. Feedback comes in comments on blogs, on another expert’s blogs, and on social media.

Publishers and the expert community know the commenters because they are open and transparent. They can weigh the feedback based on the influence of the commenters.

The file drawer effect. Experts publish to a small number of journals primarily to compete for a small number of jobs.

The journals, by design, only select a few articles that the peer reviewers think are exciting. Important commentary is tabled by judges who may not even know what’s important for the advancement of knowledge.

In addition, there are incredibly bright and passionate experts who would love to publish ideas that are not tied to the advancement of their careers. They choose not to publish in the current system — and who could blame them.

Again, give these experts a WordPress blog. Experts can publish fresh ideas in posts that can be picked up now and in years to come. Ideas available on Google and ideas that will be spread by other blogs and social media.

Publications do not foster commentary. Published articles are difficult, if not impossible, for other experts to use. The content is not searchable on Google. The content is not available on RSS feeds nor are links to the articles Tweeted. The publications are only available to subscribers. The publications cannot be openly cited for insight and commentary across the net.

How can other experts build on the published ideas? There’s no open collaboration. The only alternative is to publish commentary, if it meets peer review, in a year or two’s time to a very select group of experts.

Thought leaders publishing on blogs routinely cite other thought leaders. More than ‘closed silo articles,’ blogs are a conversation.

We listen to what other thought leaders are saying and how others are responding. We add our insight and commentary openly citing and sharing what the publisher first wrote.

The current system seems nuts when you think about it. Sure, there will be those saying they need to protect us from ourselves by saying we’d all be at risk with non peer reviewed and expert edited information.

But, to me, the train has left the station on this one. It will only be a matter of time for blogs to supplant peer reviewed expert publications.

Image courtesy of Flickr by AJ Cann

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