OPEN ACCESS, RESEARCH COMMUNITIES, AND A DEFENSE AGAINST PREDATORY JOURNALS

In this opinion article, the author describes his experiences of naming, listing, and analyzing predatory journals. The gold open-access model has led to the creation of many predatory journals that exist only to exploit researchers. Medical research is the most valuable research for humans, so we must guard against the publishing of medical research in predatory journals. Community-based journals that combine a geographical and a disciplinary focus may be seen as a defense against the pathological nature of predatory publishers.