Science Journal editors resign en masse over poor use of AI and high fees
About the holiday weekend, all but one member of the Elsevier’s editorial team Journal of Human Evolution (JHE) resigned “with deep sadness and great regret.” according to Retraction Watchwhich was helpful Online PDF the full editorial statement. It’s the 20th Mass resignation by a scientific journal since 2023 over various contentious issues, according to Retraction Watch, many of them in response to controversial changes in the academic publishing industry’s business models.
“This has been an extraordinarily painful decision for each of us,” board members wrote in their statement. “The editors who have led the journal for the past 38 years have invested tremendous time and energy in making JHE the premier journal in paleoanthropological research and have remained loyal and committed to the journal and our authors long after their tenure has ended .” The (co-editors) were equally loyal and committed. We all care deeply about the journal, our field, and our academic community. However, we realize that we can no longer work with Elsevier in good conscience.”
The editors cited several changes made over the past decade that they believe conflict with the journal’s long-standing editorial policies. This included eliminating support for an editor and a special editions editor and taking over these editorial duties. When the board expressed the need for an editor, Elsevier responded, they said, by “maintaining that editors should not pay attention to language, grammar, readability, consistency, or accuracy of proper nomenclature or formatting.”
Additionally, a major editorial restructuring is underway that aims to reduce the number of associate editors by more than half, which “will result in fewer AEs editing many more articles, on topics far outside their scope area of expertise.”
Additionally, there are plans to create a third editorial board, largely serving as a figurehead, after Elsevier took “unilateral full control” of the board’s structure in 2023 by requiring all associate editors to renew their contracts annually – which the panel believes this undermines its editorial independence and integrity.
Worst practices
Internal production was reduced or outsourced, and in 2023 Elsevier began using AI during production without informing the board, resulting in many stylistic and formatting errors, as well as reversed versions of papers that had already been accepted and formatted by editors had been. “This was extremely embarrassing for the magazine and took six months to resolve and was only achieved through the persistent efforts of the editors,” the editors wrote. “AI processing continues to be used, regularly reformatting submitted manuscripts to change meaning and formatting, and requiring extensive oversight from authors and editors during the proofreading phase.”
Additionally, author page fees at JHE are significantly higher than Elsevier’s other for-profit journals, as well as broad open access journals such as Scientific Reports. Not many of the journal’s authors can afford these fees, “which runs counter to the journal’s (and Elsevier’s) promise of equality and inclusivity,” the editors wrote.
The turning point appears to have come in November, when Elsevier informed co-editors Mark Grabowski (Liverpool John Moores University) and Andrea Taylor (Touro University California College of Osteopathic Medicine) that it was ending the dual-editor model that had existed since 1986. As Grabowki and Taylor protested, they were told that the model could only remain if they accepted a 50 percent cut in their compensation.
