Journal of Geophysics offers free Open Access to all its contents, including the English-language volumes of all three previous editions since 1924, except the latest edition's embargoed contents for the first three years after publication.

 

Ethics and plagiarism

As strongly international, this journal is neutral about scientific research and general or specific views held by different schools of thought and never takes any political or politically motivated stance on any issue.

All authors of the Journal of Geophysics must declare conflicts of interest. Appeals to editorial decisions must be made in writing and in a timely fashion.

This journal uses a set of tools to cross-check all submissions for plagiarism. We take intellectual property seriously — and by plagiarising, we mean theft of another person's words and ideas.  For details, see our full Ethics & Misconduct Policy.

 

Publication frequency

Instantly online, with a 2-6 week turnaround. Biennially in print.

 

Profit sharing

Journal of Geophysics is published under the scholar-publishers model, meaning authors do not surrender their copyright to us. Instead, and unlike corporate publishers like Elsevier or Springer Nature that resell copyright to third-parties for up to $80,000 (per paper, per transaction!), authors share copyright equally with this journal. Therefore all the proceeds from reselling copyright to third parties (corporate, academia, governments, military, and so on) are shared to equal parts (50% to the journal, 50% to the lead author). Under the Berne Convention, this protection is an inheritable right that lasts for as long as the rightsholder lives + 50 years.

By submitting to this journal, the lead author, on behalf of all co-authors, grants permission to this journal to represent all co-authors in negotiating copyright sales and collecting proceeds. The lead author should negotiate the modalities of distributing the lead author's portion of the proceeds with co-authors. Usually, this is per pre-agreed percentage of each co-author's contribution to creating the copyrighted work.

The scholar-publishers model thus enables profit sharing with authors and all the involved in the academic publishing process: scientific editors, technical editors, external referees, staff. The only obstacle to scientists getting paid for their work (as artists, engineers, entrepreneurs, inventors, lawyers, and really any other professionals) has been the existence of so-called academic publishers — private profiteers who enslaved some of the smartest people on the planet for personal gain.

 

Of impact

To top it all, the billionaire owner of Clarivate Analytics (which, after the hostile takeover of most academic indexes and databases, became a monopoly), one Eugene Garfield, known as "a man who has done enormous harm to true science", even made up the 2-year and 3-year "Impact Factors" (IF) — although the only impact of science that makes sense is the centennial impact ("on future generations"). All other impact metrics are tools for the short-term success of his (their) business model. For: every business model is only as good as the growth it can ensure, and what better growth driver than to capture one's ambition and force one to publish fiercely = more than just truly quality work. Furthermore, speaking of quality, indexes even use a per-papers-quantity as a metric to assess an individual's contribution — instead of using a weighted average.

Consequently, equal weight is assigned to all co-authorships regardless of whether they belonged to the sole/lead author or one of many co-authors. It is not uncommon nowadays for co-authors of a single paper to be counted by dozen, and sometimes they even reach 100 or more — which is happening more and more because Thank-You co-authorships are handed out like candies as the Acknowledgments section got filled with nonsensical legalese gibberish.  Believe it or not, the world record in the fake citations game belongs to a paper with — 2,274 co-authors (the same gang has quite a few repeats, like this one with 2,253 co-authors, so no more medals for them.)  The close second  place and the silver medal went to a paper with 2,217 co-authors! (But once a thief..., so the silver medalists doubled down — by publishing an Erratum (2,217 people apparently were not enough to catch an error?!), so that's 4k+ fake citations with just two stones!) The bronze went to a paper with "merely" 2,209 co-authors... And so on. But if you take a closer look, you will notice that all the "medals" in the above went to — pretty much the same people.  Why is all this plain wrong in addition to being hilarious (because how do you measure someone's contribution to a paper with more authors than words)?

 

Why short-term IF should be illegal

While the short-term "impact" factors measure just the precision of humankind's scientific endeavor (so that they do not change if it turns out after a few decades that all highly-cited journals, articles, and researchers were wrong on a subject!), only the centennial impact measures the accuracy of that endeavor (17700 citations / 550 articles in our case). In its pure, primordial form, peer review is a desirable system in which a colleague quietly and openly checks another colleague's work. However, thanks to their (by now entire) industry so masterfully crafted around mindless impactfactormania, the so-called academic publishers (whatever that meant) have hijacked the beautifully simple concept of peer-review, wrapped it up in "seven veils of mystery", and then started selling it so superbly repackaged like a box of Belgian chocolate — back to the scientists and public at large alike.

As if the above is not revolting enough: in the magical world of scientific publishing today, it is not the Editor-in-Chief who — as would be sane — hires and fires the publisher. Sadly, the exact opposite applies: an "academic publisher" in a boiler suit is the one who hires, fires, and often disciplines Editors-in-Chief!  It makes one ask: if it is not scientists themselves, who then runs the scientific process? The answer: corrupting "academic publishers" (without science background) in a close-knit cartel with corruptible government officials who channel taxpayer's research billions to "academic publishers"; and corruptible university and institute administrators who act as slavedrivers by forcing their employees to obey the rules of the "academic publishers" (by researchers surrendering the personal multimillion intellectual property to the "publishers" under duress of losing the job). Pockets filled — circle closed.

While they thus obviously hinder progress (effectively prevent paradigm shifts), the "academic publishers" have always been the only real predatory publishers. For, we never heard of "art publishers" who made artists work for free, or "inventions publishers" for whom inventors work for free either! The natural mega-growth of the "academic publishers" in the last few decades has become a burden to humankind like no other. (And no, scientists do not need to grow in numbers exponentially — discoveries do!)  That is the right time to break up a monopoly; or call on the armies — as wisely foreseen by one of the most famous victims of the above-described publishing cartel, late Professor Paul Marmet.

And even if vanity is what you want, before submitting to a journal that states a short-term IF, ask yourself: "What does the popularity of someone else's papers have to do with the popularity of my paper?" The answer: nothing whatsoever. That is how empty and meaningless short-term IFs are and why they and their short-term thrills that "academic publishers" sell to you should be illegal, the same as opiates.

In case you have missed it, we recommend you watch this short video explaining why the so-called academic publishing (corporate publishing of scientific research results) is harmful to humankind, much like the tobacco industry used to be.