New book ‘The Predator Effect’ lifts the lid on predatory publishing: The first book to share history, development and impact of deceptive practices.

Against the Grain Media is excited to share Simon Linacre's new book on predatory publishing. It's the first to chart both the rise and impact of deceptive publishing. The Predator Effect: The Past, Present and Future of Deceptive Academic Journals is available as an Open Access ebook as part of the Charleston Briefings series (https://www.charleston-hub.com/media/briefings/).

The book looks in turn at the history, development and impact of predatory journals, putting their rise in context of wider issues such as Open Access and publication ethics. Its chapters include the following issues:

● Defining predatory journals

● History of predatory publishing practices

● Open Access publishing

● Beall’s Lists and the rise of predatory journals

● Authors’ motivations

● The fightback against deceptive journals

● Future of predatory practices

Earlier this month at the Charleston Conference, Simon, a scientific communications expert with 20 years’ experience in the industry, said the publication of such a book was well overdue.

“After working in scholarly communications for 20 years, it struck me that there is very little practical guidance out there for authors on the dangers of predatory journals and how they can avoid them – and what help there is often outdated or misguided,” he said. “This book is aimed not just at authors, but everyone with an interest in enhancing research integrity and publishing ethics. Reading the book can equip people with a better awareness of how predatory journals can entrap authors, and also how to avoid citing them in their own research. It should also act as a warning sign that while predatory journals are well-established, the business model employed by predatory publishers is being adapted in other areas such as books and conferences.”

“When Simon approached me with a proposal for this book it was very easy to say yes,” said Charleston Briefings Editor-in-Chief Matthew Ismail. “Predatory publishing is a topic that can be hard to pin down, partly because of its status as a black market, partly because it's not always obvious where being 'predatory' begins in a digital publishing world that varies greatly in approach and levels of funding. Simon's briefing has made this murky topic much clearer to me!”

In addition to the chapters outlined above, the book is fully referenced and includes further reading on the subject. A print hard copy will be available later this year.

About the Author

Simon Linacre is Head of Content, Brand & Press at Digital Science. He is formerly Marketing Director at Cabells and Head of Business, Management & Economics Journals at Emerald Publishing. He has published and lectured widely on publication ethics, bibliometrics and publishing strategy. He is a Trustee of COPE and a Tutor at ALPSP. Originally from Lancashire in the UK, he lives in West Yorkshire with his wife and three children.

About Charleston Briefings

The Charleston Briefings are a series of short books (12,000 to 25,000 words) on the topic of innovation in the world of libraries and scholarly communication. The default format for the Briefings is an open access, online e-book. The audience for the Briefings is the same audience that attends the Charleston Conference: librarians, publishers, entrepreneurs in information technology, vendors and consultants. The series offers timely, readable, and focused treatments of topics of significance to practitioners in these fields. The purpose of the series is to offer the reader a useful overview that will allow them to engage more effectively with new trends and innovations in their industry.