Do any unhappy Elsevier editors want to jump ship for eLife?
As the Cost of Knowledge Elsevier boycott petition crashed through the 4500 total this afternoon and continues to add signatories (another 50 six hours later), it seems there are many former Elsevier authors, reviewers, and editors that might be looking for a prominent role in a credible open access competitor. What kind of protesters do we have? As of this moment in time, and in spite of the fact that this protest was organized by mathematicians:
- Biology- 603
- Medicine- 253
- Chemistry- 143
- Physics- 418
- Psychology- 121
At least for the large number of former-Elsevier biologists, I might suggest looking beyond the obvious proven success of Public Library of Science (PLoS), or Biomed Central (BMC) or the American Society of Microbiology’s (mBio). The new prominent open access launch that undoubtedly will create a splash is eLife, a collaborative effort of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Max Planck Society and the Wellcome Trust.
So besides the twitter feed for eLife and the November 2011 announcement of the senior editorial team, there is not much else to view of that launch process. The announcement does mention that “the senior editorial team will identify approximately 150 experts to serve as members of a Board of Reviewing Editors. “ Let’s hope that some of the former -Elsevier editors get a chance to contribute to a successful open access publishing venture.
