Herbert Open Access Journals (HOAJ) "inspired ... to allure the word Herbert"

The website of Herbert Open Access Journals (HOAJ) presents no address but seems to have been composed by someone with unusual locution. For example, HOAJ's "editor guidelines" sputter that "Here it takes an induction to all the Editors with a minimum set of goals and responsibilities in order to follow primary instructions, Publication Ethics, to acquaint the policies and other integrated procedures." As for the "Herbert" in HOAJ, "Nobel Laureate, Herbert Charles Brown has inspired us to allure the word Herbert from his name."

Of the many journals, I confined my attention to the Journal of Medical Statistics and Informatics. Although it has been around since 2011, it is not indexed in MEDLINE. It appears to be unable to keep up with affiliations of some of its editors:

• Co-editor-in-chief "Jimmy Efird, University of Newcastle, Australia" left that university over three years ago (according to his LinkedIn page). The current affiliation as shown on LinkedIn and in the American Statistical Association (ASA) directory is the Boston VA Cooperative Studies Program Coordinating Center. Dr. Efird (or at least his name) is affilated with other, clearly problematic publishers: Scientific Research Publishing (SCIRP) (editorial board, American Journal of Analytical Chemistry); Bentham Science, country editor, Current Pharmaceutical Design); SciTechnol, editorial board, International Journal of Cardiovascular Research).
• Editorial board member "Sharon Marie Homan, University of North Texas Health Sciences Center USA" was an administrator and faculty member at UNT for three years. According to LinkedIn, that ended over seven years ago, in February 2016.

Juniper's Biometrics and Biostatistics Open Access Journal (BBOAJ)

Juniper Publishers reputedly produces nonsensical articles and plagiarized papers. Its mailing address in Irvine, California, is a "Professional Mail Address For Your Business" and "Mail Forwarding Services on request" from Same Day Virtual. Its scope is extraterrestrial--it wants to reach "the research community throughout the universe." Consistent with the publisher's desire "to offer the best in class," its Global Journal of Addiction and Rehabilitation Medicine included the infamous Dr. Olivia Doll--a pit bull with a concocted C.V. of canine research--on its editorial board.

Among its 75 journals is the Biostatistics and Biometrics Open Access Journal. BBOAJ "encourages in spreading the information and advances in assorted areas that are concerned with the application of i. Statistics ... And ii. Biometrics." (In case you did not know, it defines the former as "Responsible for the proper interpretation of scientific data generated in the biology, public health and other health sciences like biomedical sciences" and the latter as "Dealing with the measurable biological characteristics.")

I looked for information on the first two "Honorable Editors." I did not look into any of the (less honorable?) "Associate Editors." At the top of the list is Siquan Wang of "Columbia University USA." According to LinkedIn, Dr. Wang received his Ph.D. this year from Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health and has experience as a graduate teaching and research assistant and a summer intern at Morgan Stanley.

The second honorable editor is Ramalingam Shanmugam of "Texas State University USA"--an "Honorary Professor of International Studies in the School of Health Administration," the President of the San Antonio Chapter of the American Statistical Association (ASA), and a recent ASA Fellow. He is listed as an editor of one journal after another from publishers that have been criticized as fraudulent or predatory--Omics (fined $50,000,000 for deceptive practices), Scholarena (discussed on this blog), Kenkyu Group, and perhaps more

Contrary to what its home page suggests, BBOAJ is not indexed for MEDLINE and is not in the National Library of Medicine collection.

The HSOA Journal of Forensic, Legal & Investigative Sciences Is Back!

After years of silence, the Journal of Forensic, Legal & Investigative Sciences (JFLIS) is back in my mailbox. In 2016, I noted that its publisher, Herald Scholarly Open Access, had one journal with a dog sitting on its editorial board. JFLIS continues in this tradition. Even with a dead man working on its board, it still "publishes up-to-date key excellences." (The post-mortem interval for the deceased population geneticist, Ranajit Chakraborty, is about 4.6 years.)

Among the other editorial members (as listed on the JFLIS website) are the following:

• Sue Black
  Professor, Department of Anatomy and Forensic Anthropology, University College Of London, UNITED STATES
• Henry C Lee
  Chair Professor, Department of Forensic Science Program, University Of New Haven, UNITED STATES
• Brion Benninger
  Executive Director, Department of Medical Anatomical Sciences, Western University Of Health Sciences, UNITED STATES
• Brooke W Kammrath
  Assistant Professor, Department of Forensic Science, University Of New Haven, UNITED STATES
• Claire Glynn
  Assistant Professor, Department of Forensic Science, University Of New Haven, UNITED STATES
• Baneshwar Singh
  Assistant Professor, Department of Forensic Science, Virginia Common Wealth University, UNITED STATES
• Marilyn T Miller
  Assistant Professor, Department of Forensic Science, Virginia Commonwealth University, UNITED STATES
• Lawrence Kobilinsky
  hairman, Science, City University Of New York, UNITED STATES
• Gloria Proni
  Associate Professor, Science Department, City University Of New York, UNITED STATES
• Artem V Domashevskiy
  Assistant Professor, Department of Sciences, John Jay College Of Criminal Justice, UNITED STATES
• Jessica Zarate
  Research Scientist, Department of Forensic Science, Ferris State University, UNITED STATES
• Eve Lowenstein
  Associate Professor, Departmenr of Dermatology, New York University School Of Medicine, UNITED STATES
• Igor Ovchinnikov
  Associate Professor, Department of Biology, University Of California, UNITED STATES
• Christian M Crowder
  Director, Department of Forensic Anthropology, UT South Western, UNITED STATES
• Charles Clifford Boyd
  Professor, Department of Anthropological Sciences, University Of Michigan, UNITED STATES
• Gisela Bichler
  Professor, Department of Criminal Justice, California State University, UNITED STATES
• Ravindra Fernando
  Forensic Pathologist, Department of Forensic Pathology and Legal Medicine, The Medico Legal Centre, UNITED STATES
• Matthew J Delisi
  Professor and Coordinator, Criminal Justice Studies, Iowa State University, UNITED STATES
• Peter D Anderson
  Forensic Pharmacologist, Randstad Healthcare Boston, UNITED STATES
• Evgeny Katz
  Professor, Chemistry & Biomolecular Science, Clarkson University, UNITED STATES
• Franklin L Dorman
  Associate Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Pennsylvania State University, UNITED STATES

Email

• From: forensicscience [forensicscience@heraldforresearchers.com]
  Sent: Friday, April 21, 2023 7:30 AM
  Subject: Formal request for submissions: Forensic, Legal & Investigative Sciences
  Dear Dr. David H. Kaye,
  Greetings from the day hope you are doing great!
  Journal of Forensic, Legal & Investigative Sciences is a bimonthly Journal with ISSN: 2473-733X
  We appreciate if you could submit a short review or a short commentary related to your previous Article entitled “Deadly statistics: quantifying an ‘unacceptable risk’ in capital punishment.” or any other topic of your interest.
  It would be great if you could submit in March so that I could process it for the Upcoming Issue. I request you to submit it by 14th April, 2023.
  You have manuscript forward it to this mail id.
  Note: We will extend the date of submission as per your convenience.
  If it is not feasible for you, please let us know your feasible time to contribute.
  Please provide me your acceptance for the same
  Regards,
  Hillary Rose
  Editorial Assistant, 2561 Herndon, VA 20171, United States

The Journal of Clinical and Medical Images Is Imploring for Manuscript

The placement of the Journal of Clinical and Medical Images on Beall's list of predatory journals was not enough to kill it, but it is still "imploring for manuscript." It claims be a U.S. journal, but it has no publisher's name associated with it, and the same Las Vegas address (down to the suite number) is used by Pure Cbd Oil (endorsed by no less than Drs. Phil and Oz), Ideal Staffing Inc., Michael and Company CPA, VHT Studios, Tromp Enterprises, and only Regus (the company that rents space and mailboxes) knows how many more unrelated businesses. The owners of the domain names on the web and in emails are hidden (registration by GDomains By Proxy).

If the people behind the facade and the ones staffing it are in the U.S., they have yet to attain the level of English language proficiency one would expect of a bona fide journal publishing in this language. The website explains that the journal "retards publishing." (Stated more fully, it "retards publishing a duplicate article which is already published.") "Authors are insisted to follow the guidelines." And so on.

In case potential marks (excuse me, I mean authors) do not know what the different fields of medicine are, the website has a list with definitions such as the following (cut and pasted in full):

Urology is the branch of diseases of the urinary organs in females and the urinary and sex organs in males. also known as genitourinary surgery, is the branch of medicine that focuses on surgical and medical diseases of the male and female urinary-tract system and the male reproductive

In sum, this journal "is an esteemed and zealous in publishing various scientific and medical journals which acts as a shell ... ." But never fear, it has photographs of its many editorial board members, and its "double blinded peer review process where authors and reviewers don’t know the identities of each other and are kept highly confidential" is unbelievably speedy. These folks "will publish within 2 weeks if the artwork is clear and acceptable."

Email

From: Journal of Clinical and Medical Images [submission@joclmeim.com]
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2022 7:42 AM
Subject: Share Your Research Through Open Access - Journal of Clinical and Medical Images (ISSN 2640-9615)
Dear Doctor. David H Kaye,
Hope you are doing well..!
It’s a great honor for me to consider you as a potential author and invite you to contribute a manuscript for consideration and publication in the forthcoming issue to be published in the Journal of Clinical and Medical Images (ISSN 2640-9615)
If you are interested kindly submit your manuscript as an attachment to the below link: ...
We will be looking forward to hearing a positive response from you soon.
Regards
Sanderson
Editorial Manager
500 N. Rainbow Blvd
Suite 300, Las Vegas
Nevada 89107 USA

From: Journal of Clinical and Medical Images [contact@joclmeim.com]
Sent: Sunday, February 19, 2023 1:24 AM
Subject: Imploring For Manuscript _ Journal of Clinical and Medical Images (ISSN 2640-9615)
Dear Doctor. David H Kaye,
As an Editorial Manager of Journal of Clinical and Medical Images (IF: 1.924*) , we are pleased to invite to contribute a manuscript to our journal.
This is an open access, peer reviewed journal and following the principles of adequate peer review processes, it acknowledges high quality theoretical and experimental research articles.
For online submission, please visit ... where you can submit your manuscript.
Hope to receive your manuscript.
Regards
Sanderson
Editorial Manager
Journal of Clinical and Medical Images (ISSN 2640-9615)
United States

From: Journal of Clinical and Medical Images [contact@jclinmimages.com]
Sent: Monday, April 3, 2023 9:18 AM
Subject: Follow-Up Mail _ Journal of Clinical and Medical Images (ISSN 2640-9615)
Dear Doctor. David H Kaye,
Greetings from Journal Of Clinical And Medical Images (IF _ 1.924*)
We are writing to Follow Up on my previous email requesting a copy of your manuscript.
Recently, we came across your published articles which are fascinating, and interesting and we consider the articles contain high academic values. Therefore, we would like to invite you to submit your manuscript to this journal.
If you are interested kindly submit your manuscript to this email: submission@jclmed.org
Thank you very much for your time and consideration.
We look forward to your positive response.
Regards
Sanderson
Editorial Manager
Sanderson

Global Research Letters: One-day Peer Review and Ghost-written Articles?

Global Research Letters has an identity crisis. On its website, it calls itself "GRL Journals," a single "journal [that] is dedicated to publishing high-quality research papers in all areas of science and technology." Never mind that it publishes papers with titles like "A New Calvinist: Reformation of Rights" and "The University of Virginia's Honor Code."

On Linkedin, it presents itself as both an "internationally recognized peer-review journal" and a "publishing solution [that] includes journals, Books, Thesis, Dissertation, Conference Proceedings, Abstract Book, Conference Special Issue, Preprints, etc." Whatever GRL is, at least it is "committed to ... maintaining publishing integrity for the benefit of humanity."

But its notion of "publishing integrity" is unusual (I hope). You can publish a paper there without writing it.

Another great service that GRL Journals offers is that if you do not have a paper ready but have a topic, you can order a paper from us. We will write the paper for you and submit it. The charges for this service are 4500 INR. This is a great option for researchers who may not have the time or resources to write a paper themselves.

You also can announce that the paper is peer-reviewed, for the journal "take[s] great care to ensure that all papers are reviewed by experts in their respective fields. This helps to ensure that only the most scientifically rigorous and well-written papers are published in our journal."

Again, you'll have to ignore the reality of the actual review process, which contributed to such "scientifically rigorous" papers as "Why Am I Reading This Case?," a long-winded missive from legal educators to their students with a list of seemingly randomly-generated references that have nothing to do with the text.

Moreover, you had better not tell anyone that the vaunted peer review occurs in a single day.

One of the key advantages of publishing with GRL Journals is our quick publication process. We understand that time is of the essence for researchers, which is why we strive to ensure that our peer-review process is completed within one day. Once the paper has been reviewed and approved, it will be published in just two days. This means that you can have your research paper online and available for others to read and cite in a matter of days.

Linkedin lists one employee for GRL -- Harshit Agarwal, identified there as "Director at Growth Guide." The GRL website lists Dr. Agarwal as editor-in-chief and affiliated with the "institute" of the University of Portsmouth, University House, Winston Churchill Ave, Portsmouth, England PO1 2UP. The rest of "editorial team" are with the following "institutes": GK Research Foundation, Well Being Research, and Growth Guide.

The address is Ithum Tower, Sector 2, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India. The Regus Ithum Tower has "co-working space" available.

AM Publication(s) and The International Research Journal of Computer Science

AM Publication (or Publications -- the website uses both spellings) is "the greatest in the field of journal publication." Each "Peer reviewed Journal" (there are three of them) is for online-only "publication of new ideas founded by academicians, educationist, engineers people."

The "Double Blind Peer reviewed" process moves at an insane pace -- "The paper will be reviewed within Two days." Or maybe not -- according to the AM journal I looked at, "Author will get their Acceptance/Rejection Notification within 3 days of submitting paper."

The journals come from "Plot-9, Varuna Golden Enclave, Opp-Anand Electronics, HOSUR - 635109 Tamil Nadu, INDIA." The publication charge is a bargain: "65 USD If author want to get one hard copy of certificate , he/she have to submit 500 INR."

The International Research Journal of Computer Science is

for publication of new ideas founded by academicians, educationist, administrator and corporate people. The research results and fundamental advancement are all aspects of innovative Research in Information Security and various disciplines, etc. IRJCS is a ... Journal which helps to academic person as well as student community.

Some "issues" consist of a single, lonely paper. The journal requires authors to assign their copyright. It will not display any article unless the would-be reader supplies an email address. Being uninclined to do that, I could not view even an abstract of the article on "The Effect of the Analytical Threshold on the Loss and Gain of Data from Single Source and Mixed DNA Samples" by Heather Miller Coyle (a professor at the University of New Haven's Henry C. Lee College of Criminal Justice and Forensic Sciences) and co-authors Aidan E. Kirby, and Jennifer Chance-Johnson.

It seems safe to say that IRJCS might not be the greatest journal for sharing research "related to Various Computer Science discipline and Advanced Technologies."

Advice for an Author Threatened by Hilaris SRL

Today I received the following email:

Sent: Monday, February 7, 2022 1:33 PM
Subject: Hilaris Publisher offers suggestions for improvisations
Dear Professor,
I hope my email finds you well
Professor, recently the journal Hillaris has contacted me asking me to pay almost $1000 for publishing my article, which I send to them in 2018. even when told them don't because I can't pay.
Professor, they publish it without my signing a copyright agreement.
Honestly, I am from a north African nation $1000 is almost 3 months' wage payment.
Profesor, they are threatening me and others according to your article in the blog with legal charges?
can you help me, by telling me what to do?
Thank you for your support
best regards

Any advice? If so, please post it (anonymously or otherwise) as a comment below. More information on the publisher is available through the search bar or the label widget on the right.