Rethinking the Functions of a Journal - some case studies from PLoS by Mark Patterson
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Transcript of Rethinking the Functions of a Journal - some case studies from PLoS by Mark Patterson
www.plos.org
“Re-engineering the scientific journal”
Mark Patterson, Director of Publishing
EDIT Meeting, Copenhagen: Oct, 2010
Committed to making the world’s
scientific and medical literature
a public resource
www.plos.org
The functions of journals
• Registration– Who’s done what and when?
• Certification– Is the work sound?
• Dissemination– The right information to the people who need it
• Preservation– Archiving for future generations
Roosendaal and Geurts
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Journals are a giant sorting mechanismOrganization
www.plos.org
Re-engineering
• Dissemination– Open access
• Organization of content– Impact and audience
• Authoring and certification– Eliminating all unnecessary delays
www.plos.org
Re-engineering dissemination
Open Access
www.plos.org
PLoS Founding Board of Directors
Harold VarmusPLoS Co-founder and Chairman of the BoardPresident and CEO of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Patrick O. BrownPLoS Co-founder and Board MemberHoward Hughes Medical Institute & Stanford University School of Medicine
Michael B. EisenPLoS Co-founder and Board MemberLawrence Berkeley National Laboratory & University of California at Berkeley
www.plos.org
• Establish high quality journals– put PLoS and open access on the map
• Build a more extensive OA publishing operation– an open access home for every paper
– achieve sustainability
• Make the literature more useful – to scientists and the public
PLoS publishing strategy
www.plos.org
PLoS BiologyOctober, 2003
PLoS MedicineOctober, 2004
PLoS Community JournalsJune-September, 2005 October, 2007
PLoS ONEDecember,2006
www.plos.org
0
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2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
PublicationsSubmissions
Growth in submissions and publications
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Financial growth
% Operating expense covered by operating revenue
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
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90%
100%
2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
www.oaspa.org
What is open access?
• Free, immediate access online
• Unrestricted use
What is open access?
• Free, immediate access online
• Unrestricted use
What is open access?
• Free, immediate access online
• Unrestricted use
What is open access?
• Free, immediate access online
• Unrestricted use
www.plos.org
A network of literature
Document
www.plos.org
A network of literature and data
Document
Database
www.plos.org
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Open access
• Free, immediate access
• Unrestricted reuse
www.plos.org
Re-engineering organization of
content
The life cycle of a research article
Journal name is keyPublication
Research
Submission
Peer review
Rejects
2-3 ExpertsIs it rigorous?Good enough?Right audience?Takes months/years
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What do we need to do before research is
published?
What is best left until after publication?
www.plos.org
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• Editorial criteria– Scientifically rigorous
– Ethical
– Properly reported
– Conclusions supported by the data
• Editors and reviewers do not ask– How important is the work?
– Which is the relevant audience?
• Use online tools to sort and filter scholarly content after publication, not before
PLoS ONE’s Key Innovation –The editorial process
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Y/E 0.83%464290602010**
0.52%440468192009
0.34%272344012008
0.16%123124972007
0.02%1384732006*
% of annual PubMed
PublicationsSubmissionsYear
*Started publishing Dec 20th, 2006
**Up to Oct 5th
Community acceptance
– largest peer-reviewed journal
– >50,000 authors
– >1300 Academic Editors
PLoS ONE – statistics
www.plos.org
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What do we need to do before research is
published?
What is best left until after publication?
www.plos.org
Who cares about
measuring researchimpact?
InstitutionsResearchers (authors and
readers)
Publishers
Funders
The public
Librarians
www.plos.org
How do we measure ‘impact’?
The impact factor of the journal in which an article is published.
Recommended reading:Adler, R., Ewing, J. Taylor, P. Citation statistics. A report from the International Mathematical Union. http://www.mathunion.org/publications/report/citationstatistics/
www.plos.org
How could we measure ‘impact’?
• Citations
• Web usage
• Expert Ratings
• Social bookmarking
• Community rating
• Media/blog coverage
• Commenting activity
• and more…
Current technology now makes it possible to add
these metrics automatically
At the ARTICLE LEVEL, we could track:
(http://tiny.cc/ALM1)
CrossRef Landing Page
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CiteULike Landing Page
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Downloading the data
http://www.plosone.org/static/plos-alm.zip
Evaluating the (usage) data
Evaluating the (usage) data
www.plos.org
Next steps for article-level metrics
• More sources for each data type– Citations, blog coverage
• New data sources– F1000, Mendeley
• Expert analysis and tools
• Broader adoption– By publishers
– By tenure committees, funders etc
• Develop and adhere to standards
The goals of PLoS Hubs
• Aggregate open access content
– Wherever it is published
• Add value to content by connecting with data
• Build communities around content
Demonstrate the power of open access
ITIS
Flickr
Wikipedia
NCBI
GBIF
Steering Committee
Michael J. DonoghueYale University
Jonathan A. EisenUniversity of California, Davis
Georgina MaceImperial College, London
David MindellCalifornia Academy of Sciences
Roderic D. M. PageUniversity of Glasgow
Richard PyleBernice P. Bishop Museum
Curators
Edward Vanden BergheOcean Biogeographic Information System
Thomas BrooksNatureServe
Brian FisherCalifornia Academy of Sciences
Robert GuralnickUniversity of Colorado, Boulder
Peter KareivaThe Nature Conservancy
Patricia MiloslavichUniversity Simon Bolivar
Hugh PossinghamUniverity of Queensland
Andy PurvisImperial College London
Peter RoopnarineCalifornia Academy of Sciences
Quentin WheelerArizona State University
The Hub Community
Next steps for PLoS Hubs
• Enhance and automate content enrichment
• Develop Hubs community
– allow users to ‘follow’ a curator
• Extend literature sources beyond PMC
– ideally to non-OA content
• Extend Hubs concept to other disciplines
• Make Hubs easy to replicate
www.plos.org
Re-engineering authoring and certification
www.plos.org
New models of scholarly communication
1 year
100 days
1 day
Conventional PLoS ONE PLoS Currents
Publication
www.plos.org
• An innovative forum for the rapid exchange of results and ideas
• Registration– Articles are date-stamped and citable
• Certification– Reviewed by expert researchers
• Dissemination– All content is open access
• Preservation– Archived at PubMed Central
PLoS Currents: Key features
www.plos.org
Seeking Lessons in Swine Flu Fight
“Another problem is communication.
Officials and experts say they have learned a lot about human swine influenza. But relatively little of that information...has been reported and published. Some experts said researchers were waiting to publish in journals, which can take months or longer.”
New York Times, August 10th, 2009
Lawrence K. Altman, M.D.
PLoS Currents – Inspiration
www.plos.org
Google Knol: Author(s) assemble content and control access and editing. Authors submit content to PLoS Currents.
PLoS Currents: Expert reviewers control posting of content, commenting and version control.
PubMed Central:Immediate transfer from PLoS Currents site; stable identifier and permanent archiving.
PLoS Currents – Workflow
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• Quick prescreen by Editors
• Submission sent to Board of Reviewers.
• Is it legitimate science and does it contain any obvious methodological, ethical or legal violations?
• Editors review comments before decision sent to author.
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From submission to publication in a few days
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PLoS Currents• Very fast• Cost-effective• Reviewed by experts • Citable• Version control• Archived at PubMed Central• Included in PubMed• Flexible and easy to replicate
www.plos.org
PLoS Currents – New sections
• Launched on Sept 2nd
– PLoS Currents: Huntington Disease (produced with support from CHDI Foundation)
– PLoS Currents: Evidence on Genomic Tests (in collaboration with the CDC)
• To be launched in a few weeks– PLoS Currents: Tree of Life (phylogeneticanalyses)
The life cycle of a research article
Journal name is keyPublication
Research
Submission
Peer review
Rejects
2-3 ExpertsIs it rigorous?Good enough?Right audience?Takes months/years
New models of scholarly communication
Focus on the articlePublication
Research
Submission
Peer reviewRejects
2-3 ExpertsIs it rigorous?Good enough?Right audience?Takes weeks/months
Enhanced article Article-level metricsIntegrated with dataOrganization in Hubs
PLoS Currents
www.plos.org
The landscape is changing
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