Starting about a year ago, I have refused to referee papers for journals owned by Elsevier, since it sticks in my craw to provide free labor for people who turn around and gouge the academic community mercilessly. This reasoning applies, to some degree, to all commercial journal publishers, though Elsevier is unusually exploitative in its pricing. There is however a more substantial reason to dislike them: their — forgive the phrase — mercenary involvement in the international arms trade. Tom Stafford, who blogs at Idiolect, is organizing a petition of academics to try to get Elsevier to stop organizing arms fairs; it's worth signing.
Posted at August 12, 2006 17:24 | permanent link