Scott Edmunds talk for the #PeerRevWk17 webinar on #PreprintPeerReview: Confessions of a pre-print & open peer review lover

1. Pre-print & Open Peer Review Lover
Scott Edmunds, Executive Editor

2. Open Review Circa 1982
http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/foodmicrostructure/vol1/iss1/ H/T Matt Hodgkinson
OPR nothing new, Food
Microstructure
published “Discussion
With The Reviewers” 35
years ago

3. Open Review Circa 1999
https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.318.7175.4

4. Open Review Circa 1999
https://bmccancer.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2407-1-5/open-peer-review
BMC Series
Medical Journals

5. Open Review Circa 2012
https://doi.org/10.1186/2047-217X-2-1
Peer review mandated open and signed (no opt-out)
Integrated with publons, & reviews credited with DataCite DOIs

6. Open Review Circa 2017
Tennant JP, Dugan JM, Graziotin D et al. A multi-disciplinary perspective on emergent and
future innovations in peer. F1000Research 2017, 6:1151
http://dx.doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.12037.1

7. Game Changer: Pre-prints
http://ec.europa.eu/research/openscience/index.cfm?section=monitor&pg=access#3

8. http://tmblr.co/ZzXdssfOMJfy
Preprints + blogged reviews = real-time open-review

9. Open Peer Review Fears
• Reviews are poorer quality?
• Reviewers are less likely to reject?
• More difficult to get reviewers
• Reviews take longer
• Authors will be vengeful

10. We can do RCTs to see efficacy
F Goodlee, JAMA 2002: dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.287.21.2762

11. Open Peer Review Myths
• Reviews are poorer quality
• Reviewers are less likely to reject
Reviews more constructive & better quality
No difference in acceptance/rejection rate
http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/9/e008707

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Med Genomics
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Genet
Data from similar scope open/closed review journals in BMC Series shows ~5-
10% harder to get referees for open review. (data from Tim Sands at BMC)
Does take marginally longer to find reviewers (and for them to return reports
– RCTs see few hours longer to write/return).
BMC Series
Medical Journals
Cost = 5-10% harder to get reviewers
More difficult to get reviewers?
Reviews take longer?

13. Open Peer Review Myths
• Authors will be vengeful
(AKA we need to protect xyz)
http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v2/n3/full/nn0399_197.html
“It might be especially difficult to find referees for authors who hold positions
of power and influence, or for those who are considered quarrelsome or
vindictive by their peers. In particular, younger, less-established scientists …
would be reluctant to reveal themselves, for fear of retaliation from their
more powerful colleagues.”

14. Open Peer Review Myths
• Authors will be vengeful
http://www.opiniomics.org/why-anonymous-peer-review-is-bad-for-science/
Hands up who in science is happy with the idea that in our field “powerful” and
“vindictive” scientists might want to “retaliate” against someone who has reviewed their
work?!! Does anyone seriously think that that’s OK?
Retaliatory, revenge attacks, by anyone, should be considered serious scientific
misconduct and the perpetrators should be identified and sacked. It’s as bad, worse,
than plagiarism or making up data. This kind of activity should spell the end of careers.
Are we expected to sit back and accept that this kind of thing might happen?!
Of course, this argument in support of anonymous peer review is actually a very
powerful argument against it. Powerful or vindictive scientists are only able to take
revenge attacks because they can hide behind a cloak of anonymity. If their reviews
were published, alongside their names, then the community would soon recognise if
they were behaving badly, and action would soon follow.
The Mick Watson Response:

15. The only drawback to open peer review?
The end of amusing reviewer 3 Downfall parody videos

16. www.gigasciencejournal.com
Join GigaPanda to
break the chains &
open everything!
scott@gigasciencejournal.com
editorial@gigasciencejournal.com
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