This last week the Biomed Central publishing group, publishers of such journals like Genome Biology, announced the merger of BMC Biology and Journal of Biology. Plus ça change is the editorial piece that explains the merger. Of more interest is Petsko’s edgy commentary on why this merger is good, and that there should be fewer specialty journals.
Petsko writes:
“Think of the places that people long to get their work published in; aren’t all of them pretty general in their coverage of biology (or science as a whole)? Isn’t the whole point of being published in such places that a great many people from a variety of fields will see the work and, ipso facto, it must be important?”
I’d like to point out that quite a few important papers, yes as important as those in some of the juggernaut general journals, are relegated by editors to specialized journals because the scope is too specific for the general readership. Take the area of missing heritability, an unknown that occupies a plurality of my mind cycles. Where will one find the key papers that ultimately dissects the relationship between genotype and phenotype? In general journals like Science, Nature, and the newly consolidated BMC Biology? Or more specialized journals like Genome Research, Genetic Epidemiology, and PLoS Genetics? Your thoughts?
Interestingly, the lines between scientifically important and sensationalism can sometimes be murky. How many times have you heard some of these general journals be called “tabloid journals?”
Petsko further writes:
“And wouldn’t more general journals help break the hegemony of the existing ones?”
I remember when Journal of Biology first came out. The creators stated the journal was meant to compete toe for toe with the likes of Nature and Science. I’ve long thought that BMC Biology and Journal of Biology were a bit redundant for the BMC publishing group. Perhaps this consolidation of readerships will allow BMC to better fulfill their original mission.
I’ve also long wondered whether the various PLoS journals particularly, PLoS Biology, PLoS Genetics, PLoS ONE, had a bit of cannibalism in them. Your thoughts are welcome.
