Listener supported WNYC Studios.

This is Science Friday. I'm Flor Lichten.

And I'm Ira Flato.

Scientific journal editors are resigning in droves.

So what's going on?

It really was a matter of ethics and conscience.

According to Retraction Watch, a watchdog publication, there have been at least 20 mass

resignations since 2023. So what's going on here? Well, if you look closely, you'll notice a common pattern.

Publishers are cutting back on the number of editors, shortening publishing deadlines,

charging hefty fees for authors to publish their work. The most recent resignation happened

at the Journal of Human Evolution at the end of last year. Both co-editors-in-chief

and the entire editorial board quit except for one person. But what does this mean for the future of

scientific publishing? Have these resignations made the big publishers change their ways? Is the

strict academic publishing system we know in danger?

Well, joining me now to answer these questions are my guests.

Dr. Andrea Taylor, former co-editor-in-chief of the journal Human Evolution,

and biological anthropologist and professor of anatomy in Vallejo, California, and Ivan Oranski,

co-founder of Retraction Watch, editor-in-chief of the transmitter and distinguished journalist

in residence at New York University's Carter Journalism Institute based in New York. Welcome

both of you to Science Friday. Good to be here. Thank you.

Great to be here. Thanks, Ira.

Ivan, did I get all of that right? Those resignations?

...