The open access landscape in Zimbabwe: the case of university libraries in ZULC

When peril responds to plague: predatory journal engagement with COVID-19

Purpose

The academic community has warned that predatory journals may attempt to capitalize on the confusion caused by the COVID-19 pandemic to further publish low quality academic work, eroding the credibility of scholarly publishing.

Design/methodology/approach

This article first chronicles the risks of predatory publishing, especially related to misinformation surrounding health research. Next, the author offers an empirical investigation of how predatory publishing has engaged with COVID-19, with an emphasis on journals related to virology, immunology and epidemiology as identified through Cabells' Predatory Reports, through a content analysis of publishers' websites and a comparison to a sample from DOAJ.

Findings

The empirical findings show that there were 162 titles related to these critical areas from journals listed on Cabells with a range of infractions, but most were defunct and only 39 had published on the pandemic. Compared to a DOAJ comparison group, the predatory journal websites were less likely to mention slowdowns to the peer review process related to the pandemic. Furthermore, another 284 predatory journals with COVID-19 engagement were uncovered from the initial exploration. These uncovered journals mostly centered on medical or biological science fields, while 42 titles came from other broader fields in social science, other STEM or humanities.

Originality/value

This study does not prove that predatory publications have released misinformation pertaining to COVID-19, but rather it exemplifies the potential within a complex academic publishing space. As these outlets have proven to be vectors of misleading science, libraries and the broader educational community need to stay vigilant as information intermediaries of online research.

Open access repositories of Bangladesh

This study examines the present status of open access repositories in Bangladesh. The main aim of the study is to find out the characteristics of open access repositories, their development scenario and ranking in web repositories as well as to recommend some suggestions for the development of open access repositories in Bangladesh. The methodology includes a quantitative approach. The data were collected from OpenDOAR from 20 to 29 August 2017. The scope of the study is confined to Bangladeshi repositories indexed in the OpenDOAR database. The findings of the study show that the Bangladeshi repositories are embodied in the Ranking of Web Repositories. The study also clearly indicates the very slow progress of open access repositories in Bangladesh. The repositories in Bangladesh listed in OpenDOAR are mostly institutional in nature. The study also reveals that a maximum number of repositories are small in terms of collection. It can be easily summarized that there is a need for public awareness regarding the concept of open access repositories in Bangladesh to support research and development. This paper is the first attempt in Bangladesh to discuss and analyze the overall scenario of open access repositories. It also suggests some recommendations for developing the open access repository system in Bangladesh which will surely add value to the future research of open access in Bangladesh.