A few months later, by chance or by someone’s comments about the publisher, you find out that the publisher is not an accredited or reputable publisher.  In fact, you are referred to a list of blacklisted or predatory publishers, e.g. Beallslist.net, Stop Predatory Journals, Retraction Watch and others. (See Additional Reading below). 

This is very disappointing as you find out that you will lose out on citations, as well as any research incentive funds that may be available for publication in accredited journals.  You will also not receive any assistance or refund on the fee you paid to the publisher.   

What do you do now? 

Unfortunately, it is impossible to withdraw a paper once it has been published.  In essence, the paper is lost to you.  You will not be cited by reputable researchers, your h-index will be negatively affected, and your work, although of a high standard, will be devalued or disregarded because the journal or publisher itself is categorised as unscrupulous, questionable, or predatory. 

How will it affect your CV, chances for new positions or promotions, etc?   

Unfortunately, it will not look good on your CV. However, do not remove or omit it from your CV.  Potential employers or interviewers for promotion can search the Web and find all your online publications, even the ones published in predatory or questionable publications.  To avoid embarrassment, should they ask you why the article is not included in your CV, rather include it under a separate heading.  Include all your works published in reputable journals or books under “Publications” and then include those published in predatory or questionable publications under the heading “Other Publications”.   If for any reason you published in an accredited journal a few years ago, and the journal has since been removed from current accredited lists because of plagiarism, poor quality, or predatory practices, then you should include it under “Publications” but in brackets state that at the time of publication (underline the date), the work was included in an accredited list, e.g. Scopus, ISI or another relevant accredited list.     

Additional Reading: 

Beallslist.Net
Stop Predatory Journals
Retraction Watch

Photo by Susan Yin on Unsplash

The Cambridge Dictionary’s definition of ‘hijacking’ is “to take control of or use something that does not belong to you for your own advantage”.  Various types of hijackings are instigated by predatory publishers (those that side-step international best practice and scholarly publishing standards to exploit authors purely for economic gain) and questionable publishers (those that are not necessarily predatory but offer shoddy or less than acceptable publishing standards). This blog article provides some examples of hijackings in academia. 

A common practice amongst questionable or predatory publishers is to hijack the names of reputable titles to create confusion so authors submit their manuscripts to their websites instead of the reputable publication.  In many instances, they use the same name of the journal title with a slight amendment, for example, they spell one of the words incorrectly, perhaps using the letter ‘s’ twice or omitting a letter, which is not always noticed by potential authors.  They may add a few words to the title, for example, the correct name of the reputable journal may be the ‘Journal of Hydraulic Technology’, but a slightly different name is provided by the hijackers. The hijacked title may appear as the ‘Journal of Hydraulic Technology and Systems’, or the ‘Journal of Hydraulics and Technology’, or the ‘Journal of Hydraulic Technology, USA’.  Unless the author is in the habit of checking titles to see that they are on accredited journal lists and that the publishers embrace international best practice and standards, the author may be duped into publishing with the hijacked title. Once a paper is published with a predatory or questionable publisher, it is a lost paper to the author.  Savvy researchers will not cite the paper, which means the author and his/her institution will not receive recognition for the paper or research incentive funding from the Department of Higher Education and Training in South Africa 

Once a paper is submitted to a questionable or predatory publisher, it is difficult to withdraw it. In one instance, an academic and postgraduate student submitted a manuscript to a publisher which they believed was reputable.  Whilst checking whether the title was listed on the South African Department of Higher Education and Training’s accredited list, for purposes of assisting them with payment of the article processing charge (APC), a librarian pointed out to them that this was on a blacklist or list of predatory publishers. They were advised to ask the publisher to withdraw the paper, ‘on the basis that their Faculty required them to expand on some sections of the paper before it was published’.  This was the excuse used to try to get the paper withdrawn, without raising any issues about the publisher being predatory.  The authors requested a withdrawal of their paper. The publisher responded by saying that the paper could be withdrawn on payment of a fee of $500, and if this fee were not paid, their paper would be published without the names on it.  To assist the authors, the librarian periodically checked to see whether the paper had been published.  A few months later, the paper was found online. It had been published under fictitious names but stated they were affiliated with a reputable institution.  This situation created two problems for academia – firstly, the authors lost their quality journal article to a predatory publisher and would not get any citations in the future; secondly, anyone citing the work would be citing fictitious authors, and in the process, contributing to citation pollution and the spread of false information in the broader knowledge pool.  

Paper hijacking, copyright infringement, and plagiarism have become serious challenges in academia. In some instances, hijackers seek to steal unpublished manuscripts and then sell them to people intending to publish their own works.  Some hijackers create fake CVs and then try to join journal editorial boards to steal unpublished manuscripts for their own financial benefit (Dadkhah, 2015)¹.  Many hijackers lift or steal large sections from other authors’ papers and include them in their own papers, without acknowledgement. This is blatant plagiarism, and without permission to use so much content, this is copyright infringement.  Unless the plagiarised and infringed work is accessible online, legitimate authors would not know that their works have been hijacked in such a way.  

The hijacking of personal names is also a problem for you, as scholarly authors.  This is when unscrupulous publishers add your name as an author or editor, without your knowledge. Your name appears on the publication as a co-author or editor, even though you have had nothing to do with the creation of the work.  It is difficult to have your name removed from such works once they are published or translated into another language, especially if the work is not published online.  It is wise to set up online alerts to receive notifications when your name has been used in a publication, so you can check your name has not been hijacked.  

It is important that scholarly authors become vigilant about the abovementioned practices by questionable and predatory publishers, who fail to follow international best practices and scholarly publishing standards and devalue the author’s papers.  

Some additional reading: 

• Hijacking in the Academic World – Our Experiment in Scholarly Publishing 
• Hijacked Journals: An Emerging Challenge for Scholarly Publishing 

• Reliability of Hijacked Journal Detection Based on Scientometrics, Altmetric Tools and Web Informatics: A Case Report Using Google Scholar, Web of Science and Scopus 
• The full story of 90 hijacked journals from August 2011 to June 2015 

Photo by Bermix Studio on Unsplash

The ‘’publish or perish’’ syndrome puts pressure on authors to increase the number of research outputs each year.  It often drives them to sign contracts hurriedly, without taking time to peruse the content (and small  print) to ensure they understand the implications of each clause.  In many cases, contracts are strongly skewed in favour of the publisher and only after the author has signed the contract, do they come to realise that they have surrendered all or most of their rights to the publisher for the entire copyright term. Should they wish to update, revise, translate, share, condense for another publication, or do any other acts that authors generally have the right to do, they will have to obtain prior permission from the publisher.      

Authors have rights in terms of the current Copyright Act no. 98 of 1978 (as amended).  The law gives authors a ‘’bundle’’ or “suite” of exclusive rights, which they can enjoy for their entire lifetime, plus 50 years from the end of the year in which they die, subject to some exceptions.  For example, copyright in a literary or musical work vests the exclusive right to do or to authorize the doing of any of the following acts in the Republic:¹ 

(a) Reproducing the work in any manner or form; 

(b) publishing the work if it was hitherto unpublished; [Para. (b) substituted by s. 6 of Act 125 of 1992.] 

(c) performing the work in public; 

(d) broadcasting the work; 

(e) causing the work to be transmitted in a diffusion service, unless such service transmits a lawful broadcast, including the work, and is operated by the original broadcaster; [Para. (e) substituted by s. 3 (b) of Act 56 of 1980.] 

(f) making an adaptation of the work; 

(g) doing, in relation to an adaptation of the work, any of the acts specified in relation to the work in paragraphs (a) to (e) inclusive. [S. 6 amended by s. 3 (a) of Act 56 of 1980.] 

The Act sets out other rights relating to photographs, music, films, audio-visual works, and other works.  You are encouraged to read the Act to find out more about the exclusive rights relating to those works.  

When submitting a manuscript to a publisher, always ensure you keep a copy.  Request a written receipt.  Always follow the publisher’s author guidelines, referencing style and any other instructions, otherwise your work could be referred back to you for correction or be rejected outright.  

When discussing your manuscript with a publisher, always try to negotiate a fair and balanced deal, which benefits you and the publisher, not just the publisher.  Read each clause and ask questions if you do not understand how they affect you.  Seek advice from a legal advisor or a senior academic in your Faculty or someone who publishes often in reputable academic publications.  

Know your rights!  You do not have to accept everything that is in the contract.  You do not have to sign over all your rights to a publisher.  Also, you cannot sign over your moral rights, which are personal or reputational rights which give you, the author, the right to be named the author of the work, and to protect the integrity of your work against mutilation and distortion, plagiarism and falsification of data in your work, defamatory statements, etc.   

If there is something you are not happy with in the contract or publishing process raise your concerns sooner than later.  Generally, you will be given a standard publisher’s agreement to sign. If you do not agree with a clause or wording, try and find an amicable solution or a more suitably written clause or sentence that is acceptable to you and the publisher.  Where necessary, delete a clause if it is not relevant to your manuscript, e.g. if you have agreed that the work can only be published in print, then delete any clauses that state that the work can be digitally published as well; or if the work is only to be published in a specific region or for a specific purpose in your own country, then delete any clauses that state the work can be published globally or for any other purpose.  

Try to negotiate a non-exclusive licence with the publisher, instead of an exclusive licence. A non-exclusive licence gives you the option of giving your work to more than one publisher for different purposes. You may, for instance, licence the first publisher internationally to publish your work in English in print and digital format, whilst a second publisher (maybe regional or local) can be licensed to publish in an indigenous or foreign language, in hard-copy only. In other words, you, as the author, can exploit your intellectual property rights as you wish, without restriction or being tied to one publisher only.  In an exclusive licence, you and the publisher agree that no other person or legal entity may exploit the relevant intellectual property rights, except the licensee, in this case, the publisher.  In an exclusive licence, you relinquish your rights and grant exclusive rights to the publisher for the full copyright term.  

Consider attaching an Author’s Addendum² to the publisher’s agreement, which sets out certain rights and allows you to retain certain rights, e.g. to place a copy of your work on an institutional repository, and/or to share your paper with colleagues or students, etc.  Some publishers will consider an Addendum, whilst others will not accept it.  If you do not ask, you will not know if the publisher is prepared to grant any concessions. Do not be afraid to ask, otherwise you may land up with a contract which restricts or prohibits you from doing certain acts with your own paper.  You basically lose or have reduced control over your own work, which in the digital environment is not the best way to exploit your intellectual property rights.   

Additional Reading: 

• An Introduction to Copyright Resources for Authors 
• Author Rights Resources: Understanding Author Rights (USA) 
• Author Rights – Scholarly Communication – Guides at Health Sciences Library System 
• Authors’ Registry (UK) 
• Authors’ Rights (SPARC) 

• Authors and Copyright 
• Digital Books and Your Rights 
• What everybody knows 
• Understanding Rights Reversion- When, Why, & How to Regain Copyright and Make Your Book More Available (a reversion clause is in the SA Copyright Amendment Bill which is currently under review in Parliament).  

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash