"Intrigued by a citation-boosting service that we unravelled during our investigation, we contacted the service while undercover as a fictional author, and managed to purchase 50 citations. These findings provide conclusive evidence that citations can be bought in bulk, and highlight the need to look beyond citation counts."
Update. " 'The capacity to purchase citations in bulk is a new and worrying development,' says Jennifer Byrne, a cancer researcher at the University of Sydney who has studied problematic publications in the biomedical literature…A researcher’s h-index and the number of citations they’ve garnered are often used for hiring and promotion decisions." https://www.science.org/content/article/vendor-offering-citations-purchase-latest-bad-actor-scholarly-publishing
Gee, maybe - just maybe - the entire publish-or-perish and highly profitable journals system itself is the root of the problem. We were taught peer review would suss out all problems, but that was a smokescreen as the only mechanism allowed it is to publish a rebuttal in the same highly siloed journal.
Add comment