On 2016 Aug 28, Jaime A. Teixeira da Silva commented:

There are at least two extremely serious - and possibly purposefully misleading - errors in the terms used in this paper. Or perhaps, as I argue, they are not errors, but reflect a seismic shift in "predatory" publishing ideology eschewed by Jeffrey Beall.

Beall refers to such "deceitful" publishers as "predatory" publishers. He even refers to his original paper incorrectly [1]. The original term that Beall coined in 2010 was "predatory" open-access scholarly publishers, referring specifically to open access (OA) publishers. His blog, named “scholarlyoa” also reflects this exclusive focus on OA.

His purposeful omission of the term OA in this paper published by J Korean Med Sci reflects not only the omission of the term OA from the entire title and text, and even from the original definition, it also reflects very lax editorial oversight in the review of this paper. For the past 6 years, Beall has focused exclusively on OA, and has indicated, on multiple occasions on his blog, that he does not consider traditional (i.e., print or non-OA) journals or publishers.

Why then has Beall purposefully omitted the term OA?

Why has there been an apparent seismic shift in this paper, and in Beall’s apparent position in 2016, in the definition of "predatory"? By purposefully (because it is inconceivable that such an omission by Beall, a widely praised scholar, could have been accidental) removing the OA limit, and allowing any journal or publisher to be considered "predatory", Beall is no longer excluding the large publishers. Such publishers include Elsevier, SpringerNature, Nature Publishing Group, Taylor & Francis / Informa, or Wiley, which include the largest oligopolic publishers that dominate publishing today [2].

Does this shift in definition also reflect a shift in Beall's stance regarding traditional publishers? Or does it mean that several of these publishers, who publish now large fleets of OA journals, can no longer be excluded from equal criticism if there is evidence of their “predatory” practices, as listed by Beall [3]?

The second misleading aspect is that Beall no longer refers to such OA journals as simply "predatory". His definition evolved (the precise date is unclear) to characterize such publishers as "Potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly open-access publishers" [4] and journals as "Potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly open-access journals" [5]. Careful examination of this list of words reflects that almost any journal or publisher could be classified as “predatory”, provided that it fulfilled at least one of the criteria on the Beall list of “predatory” practices.

So, is Beall referring exclusively to the lists in [4] and [5] in his latest attack on select members of the OA industry, or does his definition also include other publishers that also publish print journals, i.e., non-OA journals?

Beall needs to explain himself carefully to scientists and to the public, because his warnings and radical recommendations [6] have to be carefully considered in the light of his flexible definitions and swaying lists.

The issue of deceitful publishers and journals affects all scientists, and all of us are concerned. But we should also be extremely concerned about the inconsistency in Beall's lists and definitions, and the lack of clear definitions assigned to them. Because many are starting to call on the use of those lists as "black lists" to block or ban the publication of papers in such publishers and journals. I stand firmly against this level of discriminatory action until crystal clear definitions for each entry are provided.

We should also view the journals that have approved these Beall publications with caution and ask what criteria were used to approve the publication of these papers with faulty definitions?

Until then, these "warnings" by Beall may in fact represent a danger to freedom of speech and of academics' choice to publish wherever they please, with or without the explicit permission or approval of their research institutes, even though the Beall blog provides some entertainment value, and as a crude “warning system”.

[1] Beall J. "Predatory" open-access scholarly publishers. Charleston Advis 2010;11:10–17. [2] Larivière V, Haustein S, Mongeon P (2015) The Oligopoly of Academic Publishers in the Digital Era. PLoS ONE 10(6): e0127502. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0127502 [3] https://scholarlyoa.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/criteria-2015.pdf [4] https://scholarlyoa.com/publishers/ [5] https://scholarlyoa.com/individual-journals/ [6] Beall J. Predatory journals: Ban predators from the scientific record. Nature 534, 326. doi: 10.1038/534326a (also read some pertinent criticism in the comments section of that paper)

On 2016 Aug 28, Jaime A. Teixeira da Silva commented:

There are at least two extremely serious - and possibly purposefully misleading - errors in the terms used in this paper. Or perhaps, as I argue, they are not errors, but reflect a seismic shift in "predatory" publishing ideology eschewed by Jeffrey Beall.

Beall refers to such "deceitful" publishers as "predatory" publishers. He even refers to his original paper incorrectly [1]. The original term that Beall coined in 2010 was "predatory" open-access scholarly publishers, referring specifically to open access (OA) publishers. His blog, named “scholarlyoa” also reflects this exclusive focus on OA.

His purposeful omission of the term OA in this paper published by J Korean Med Sci reflects not only the omission of the term OA from the entire title and text, and even from the original definition, it also reflects very lax editorial oversight in the review of this paper. For the past 6 years, Beall has focused exclusively on OA, and has indicated, on multiple occasions on his blog, that he does not consider traditional (i.e., print or non-OA) journals or publishers.

Why then has Beall purposefully omitted the term OA?

Why has there been an apparent seismic shift in this paper, and in Beall’s apparent position in 2016, in the definition of "predatory"? By purposefully (because it is inconceivable that such an omission by Beall, a widely praised scholar, could have been accidental) removing the OA limit, and allowing any journal or publisher to be considered "predatory", Beall is no longer excluding the large publishers. Such publishers include Elsevier, SpringerNature, Nature Publishing Group, Taylor & Francis / Informa, or Wiley, which include the largest oligopolic publishers that dominate publishing today [2].

Does this shift in definition also reflect a shift in Beall's stance regarding traditional publishers? Or does it mean that several of these publishers, who publish now large fleets of OA journals, can no longer be excluded from equal criticism if there is evidence of their “predatory” practices, as listed by Beall [3]?

The second misleading aspect is that Beall no longer refers to such OA journals as simply "predatory". His definition evolved (the precise date is unclear) to characterize such publishers as "Potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly open-access publishers" [4] and journals as "Potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly open-access journals" [5]. Careful examination of this list of words reflects that almost any journal or publisher could be classified as “predatory”, provided that it fulfilled at least one of the criteria on the Beall list of “predatory” practices.

So, is Beall referring exclusively to the lists in [4] and [5] in his latest attack on select members of the OA industry, or does his definition also include other publishers that also publish print journals, i.e., non-OA journals?

Beall needs to explain himself carefully to scientists and to the public, because his warnings and radical recommendations [6] have to be carefully considered in the light of his flexible definitions and swaying lists.

The issue of deceitful publishers and journals affects all scientists, and all of us are concerned. But we should also be extremely concerned about the inconsistency in Beall's lists and definitions, and the lack of clear definitions assigned to them. Because many are starting to call on the use of those lists as "black lists" to block or ban the publication of papers in such publishers and journals. I stand firmly against this level of discriminatory action until crystal clear definitions for each entry are provided.

We should also view the journals that have approved these Beall publications with caution and ask what criteria were used to approve the publication of these papers with faulty definitions?

Until then, these "warnings" by Beall may in fact represent a danger to freedom of speech and of academics' choice to publish wherever they please, with or without the explicit permission or approval of their research institutes, even though the Beall blog provides some entertainment value, and as a crude “warning system”.

[1] Beall J. "Predatory" open-access scholarly publishers. Charleston Advis 2010;11:10–17. [2] Larivière V, Haustein S, Mongeon P (2015) The Oligopoly of Academic Publishers in the Digital Era. PLoS ONE 10(6): e0127502. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0127502 [3] https://scholarlyoa.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/criteria-2015.pdf [4] https://scholarlyoa.com/publishers/ [5] https://scholarlyoa.com/individual-journals/ [6] Beall J. Predatory journals: Ban predators from the scientific record. Nature 534, 326. doi: 10.1038/534326a (also read some pertinent criticism in the comments section of that paper)