Getting clearer (was: Re: [jox-tech] Re: Unclear how the journal works)
- From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
- Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2011 17:22:45 +0100
Hi Mathieu!
3 days ago Mathieu ONeil wrote:
I looked at your use cases again
Thanks for this. For me this is really constructive!
and don't find them that specific either:
-who decides who gets to be a contributor
My proposal was that a contributor is based on a self-selection.
According to the use cases a contributor may post proposals or
articles and I understood that this should be open to everyone without
asking for permission.
and access the site? at least with the list potential mischief is minimised
The use case descriptions grant access to the site for a contributor
only to his/her own stuff so I don't see what can go wrong here.
-how do reviews travel from reviewers to authors?
The channel review results move to the authors would be the page in
the site.
completely
transparently? this can only inhibit candid reviews IMO
Indeed the use cases don't describe this in depth. In fact they don't
distinguish between various sub-roles of responsibles. This is due to
the fact that a year ago I didn't have that clear - as I wrote in the
accompanying mail.
I'd like to update the use cases with this in mind:
* Create a separate reviewer role
* A reviewer may have an alias which is different from his name so he
can act anonymously but still is traceable
* An additional use case adding reviewers to a submitted article
* Create an editor role
* Make the use case of adding reviewers available only to the editor
* Limit the availability of review activities to the respective
reviewers
* Add an object type of review results which is created by a reviewer
* Add a use case entering a review result
* Add a use case of viewing review results which initially is
available only, the reviewer and the editor
* Add a use case where the review results are approved by the editor
and then are available to the author of the article
-I don't see why there could not be more than one method of
submitting, depending on how trusted you are (as I said before a
centralised tracking system would be better)
According to the use cases described submission of articles is open
for contributors and thus needs no special trust. But I'm not sure
whether this answers the point you are making.
If you talk of technical channels such as site or mail: To get
transparency we need a centralized tracking system which I think the
site is the optimal place for. We may allow for initial mail
submissions but they need to be put to the site and processed there to
have some standardization in the process. This only requires an
account for the submitter - which IMHO is not asked to much.
-re the mailing list it is described on the site as an integral part
of the process, I wont go into that again, I am not "silently"
changing anything, see the Toni Prug article which we quote on the
site about community vetting and feedback. everyone gets to see it
Now I understood that the community aspect is an important one for
you. I agree with that. However, a mailing list is only one way to
implement it. Nowadays web based tools are commonplace so I don't see
why this shouldn't work. In particular since a community around the
proposals / submissions / reviews has all these artifacts to deal with
I think a web based tool is more useful in this case.
A web based solution can and should have an option for notification on
changes by email. But contrary to a mailing list such a notification
option allows for people to subscribe in those topics they are really
interested in.
Please note that IMHO this is different from the organizational
aspects of the project. IMHO a mailing list is better suited for this
purpose.
-by the way, only proposals - summaries are supposed to be posted to
the list, so it makes perfect sense to post the whole paper on the
site
I don't understand this.
-I will post all research paper submissions (three so far) to the website
:-)
-I will document better
:-)
-But I insist that there needs to be some confidentiality about
reviews - this can only be done because one person, known as the
editor, acts as an intermediary between reviewers and authors
No problem. See above.
-I suppose it boils down to trust. Do you really think I am on a
power trip or whatever? My only aim is to publish the best content
possible. If you don't believe me, what can I say
As I said on the main list trust - or rather: controlling power - is
one aspect about transparency. Enabling others to do some work is
another one.
pps. More responses below>>>
----- Original Message -----
From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
Date: Monday, January 24, 2011 6:59 pm
Besides this the mailing list isn't open for anyone to post - so the
whole proposal won't work at all. If it would we would have a spam
problem.
[?? can't anyone subscribe??]
Sure anyone can subscribe - but subscribing to a mailing list is a big
deal compared to creating an account in the site.
Instead it is only open for postings of subscribers. Therefore
to make
sure that a proposal is recognized one has to subscribe to the mailing
list. Subscribing to the mailing list, however, is usually a major
decision because at least I for one don't want to be flooded by mails
From a mailing list I'm not really interested in.
[well if someone is submitting a paper they are probably interested
in the journal as well
I wouldn't expect that.
- but hey, we can just create another submission list if you want]
Which would be an improvement but doesn't really solve the problem
with the necessity of an unspecific subscription. To do this with
mailing lists you'd need a mailing list for each and every new
submission - which I think you agree would not be feasible.
From what I understand you are trying to extend the community by
subscribing people to a mailing list on any possible occasion. Though
I understand the intention I don't think this is a proper way of
building a community. If I would be forced this way into something I'm
not really interested in it is very likely that I would not post to
the journal at all.
I'd prefer this way: To increase the size of the community make it
visible and open to subscripition. Then people who are really
interested in being part of the community can subscribe themselves.
This gives people the freedom to act as they please instead of getting
forced the community down their throats.
c-full paper formally submitted to editor or posted directly
to restricted part of site (if the author has access rights)
Again no transparency here if posted to the editor.
[Right, so we just let whoever post whatever to the site - as opposed to posting to the mailing list?]
In the site it would sit in an area only available for the
responsibles. That does no harm IMHO.
f-editor provides this feedback to author
By which facility? Remember that we discussed that we want to
make the
feedback transparent as well.
[Yeah, after the review process is completed]
Ah, ok. What you want is that you have a review process which is
hidden from the author and a dedicated point in time when you make the
review results available to the author. Is this correct?
If so we would have (at least) another use case - which is already
included above.
My idea was to simply post the review results as comments or so to the
article so they are available to the author as soon as they are there.
That would give the author a chance to react immediately - but may be
that is something you don't want because the article to be reviewed
may then become a moving target.
g-author (accepts or rejects feedback and) re-submits full paper
How and to whom? By what facility?
[That would be the editors role, I guess]
Why is the editor needed? Wouldn't it suffice if the author re-submits
to the site?
h-reviewers rate this re-submission
The only point you see a problem:
> [still undecided -> we need a way to present the rating
system?]
Which BTW still is a open point.
i-author decides whether he/she is happy to publish with these
ratings
How?
[They tell the editor]
[You seem to think people will be OK with having their crappy paper
criticised in public - they may not - they may prefer not to publish
at all - this system gives them a choice]
Not at all. The review comments can be visible to the author and the
editor without a problem. See above.
k-reviewer reports are published/not published (pending
author/reviewers agreement)
How?
[they tell the editor what they want to do or they publish them themselvesm]
[if you are worried there will be abuses of editorial power the list acts a permanent forum for problems to be debated]
[i am trying to have openness and a good review system = dont know how all reviews can be open from the start... people will not be as frank IMO - we can discuss this on the main list if you want]
No need. I have no problem with review results having limited access
rights.
Grüße
Stefan