On science publishing in general and JCS in particular

It's not often that you are asked to come up with an article to a strict deadline but with absolutely no constraints as to the content. It's a challenge but also a luxury. Without a moment's hesitation I chose the journal as my topic. After all it is in JCS that I published my first papers; its editorial board was the first editorial board that I joined; and, of course, since I became Editor-in-Chief it has occupied a significant proportion of my waking thoughts. I was a PhD student in the laboratory of one of the Editors of the journal (now retired), and so it seemed natural that my thesis work would be published in JCS (though, come to think of it, no other options were on offer). We worked hard on my first manuscript until we had it in a form that we were satisfied with. I then left the manuscript with my advisor and, a few days later, he told me that the referees were positive and that the paper was now in press. (Oh happy days - now that I'm Editor my papers get rejected from JCS with some regularity.) While this gave me a very positive experience of science publishing in general and of JCS in particular, it did leave me completely unprepared for the more conventional review process. I was quite shocked when, as a postdoc, I submitted my first paper to a non-JCS journal (J. Cell Biol. in fact) and received referees' reports that were a) in writing, b) critical and c) took almost two months to arrive. I also discovered that JCS did not enjoy the same star billing at MIT as in Oxford and, when I rushed to the library to see my precious papers in print, it was some time before I located the journal in a dusty corner of the building. So, as we hurtle into the new Millennium, are my experiences as a PhD student relevant to publishing in JCS today? I believe that the answer is yes, for two reasons. First, because JCS still strives to be very author-friendly and, second, because any journal inevitably reflects the personalities and tastes of its Editors. JCS has always put the author first. Tangible examples of this philosophy are the open and rapid review process (ahem, I know we do slip up occasionally, so no need to interrupt my New Year hangover with any reminders), rapid, high quality publication, lack of page charges, free reprints and free colour. These features of the journal have undoubtedly benefited non-JCS authors, as competitor journals have been forced to adopt some of our policies. We are also unusual in being owned by a non-profit organisation that is committed to returning the (not inconsiderable) profits of the journal to the scientific community, through support for conferences, grants to allow scientists to visit other laboratories, and so on. While being kind to authors isn't controversial (is it?), the issue of journal content certainly is. We all grumble that such and such a journal ‘likes’ one research area and ‘dislikes’ another, and there is no doubt that for any given journal it is easier to publish some types of paper than others (thereby, of course, creating a convenient niche for new journals to fill). Here I would make two points: you can't publish papers that aren't submitted; and it is much easier to edit a journal with a modest number of submissions (JCS pre-1992) than to edit one in which the number of submissions exceeds the page allocation by a factor of greater than four (JCS at the cusp of the Millennium). As the impact factor of JCS has crept upwards, submissions have soared, but there is still a need to attract stronger papers, and so I spend a fair amount of time talking to potential authors and soliciting manuscripts, using any of the inducements at my disposal (sliding scale available on request). Along the way I seem to spend a lot of time over drinks in dingy conference bars, listening to authors' tales of cruel mistreatment at the hands of other journals; sometimes it is a struggle to remember exactly what I promised once I am safely back in my own lab. My tastes in cell biology are famously eclectic, but at some point in the last few years we no longer had space to publish all the scientifically sound papers that were being submitted. We were forced to resort to editorial rejections. This is when an Editor decides that a piece of work should not appear in the journal, even if the referees were to be positive, and therefore that the paper should not be sent out for review. Ouch! It always hurts to have a paper rejected in this way. We bend over backwards to spell out at the front of the journal the type of paper that will be editorially rejected and to explain the reasons for rejection in the decision letter to the author. An author can always appeal, in which case we will almost always send the paper out for review (and sadly the referees almost always tick the ‘too descriptive’, insufficient advance' or ‘insufficient general interest’ box on the report form). Even if space were not a limitation (and it will not be when hard copy journals disappear) there would still be the constant desire to improve the quality of the journal, the crude index of which is the impact factor. It is worth pointing out that the motivation to publish better and better science is largely the Editors' own and has almost nothing to do with the commercial success of the journal. It comes as a surprise to most scientists to discover that a large portfolio of journals with tiny circulations and mediocre content can potentially make as much money as one blockbuster journal; if the authors pay high enough page charges you enter the lucrative world of vanity publishing. Nor does it matter if a journal has a life span of only a few years; its demise is devastating for the scientists who put so much effort into it, but for the publisher it can simply be replaced with another new journal and another new title. Oops, I am beginning to sound cynical (but remember that I am writing this in 1999 and the rays of the new Millennium have yet to warm my soul). If the discrepancy between commercial success and scientific success is one issue that I brood on, the other is the growing ‘professionalisation’of science publishing. ‘Amateur’ editors, such as myself, who combine editing with running a research lab, are not quite an endangered species, but we are probably decreasing in number. We are being replaced by people who have left bench science after a PhD and, often, postdoctoral training and have taken up science publishing as a career. There have always been PhDs involved in different aspects of journal publishing, but I am thinking particularly of the growing numbers who actually determine the scientific content of the journal. At their best professional Editors are unparalleled in the flair that they bring to the job - witness the legendary Miranda Robertson and Benjamin Lewin. At their worst they have the mentality of failed postdocs, their understanding of science frozen at the point where they retired, injured, from the fray. At conferences they will assiduously take notes during the talks by their former colleagues and stare blankly into space when subjects that they are unfamiliar with are presented. They become fashion junkies, unable to decide for themselves what their journal should be publishing this season. The JCS experience of ‘professionalisation’, I hasten to add, has been totally positive (otherwise this bit would have been mysteriously edited out!). By recruiting a staff editor we have been able to take new initiatives we simply didn't have the time or energy for before. Without him ‘Editorials’, ‘In This Issue’ and a constant flow of interesting review articles would never have become reality - and there are plenty of other innovations in the pipeline. I believe in a partnership between the amateurs and the professionals, with the amateurs providing an accountability and a practical perspective that can only come from being active in the lab. No article about science publishing is complete without some pontification on electronic publishing. I'm all for it (electronic publishing, that is) for all the reasons that are rehearsed ad nauseam, but also out of nostalgia for those papers I published when I was a PhD student. Electronic publication can free us from the severe restrictions that are currently imposed on the length of individual articles. Of course it is already possible to publish supplementary material, such as movies and methods, on journal web sites, but what I would like to see is a return to longer reference lists. When I was beavering away on my first JCS paper, I took great trouble to cite all the relevant literature, both recently published and ancient (i.e. more than three years old). These days, so often, in the interests of space we restrict our citations to the newest papers, the papers in the top three journals or, worse, avoid the primary publications altogether and rely on reviews. All too often the Acknowledgements at the end of an article will include a blanket apology to those authors whose work could not be cited owing to lack of space. It would be doing science a great service if we could, once more, enjoy the luxury and the responsibility of placing our own work both in the context of the papers that preceded it and in a wider context than our own narrow research area. So, happy Millennium - and thank you to all the unsung heroes of JCS: the authors, referees, Editors and board members and all the staff who miraculously turn the constant deluge of accepted papers into a rather fine journal.