Nova Science Publishers? Scam? Vanity Press? Legit?

[drkitten]

I just got a note in my email. It reads (-ish):

Dear Dr. Kitten,
We have learned of your published research on [bla]. We would like to invite your participation in our publishing program. In particular, I have in mind a new research or review article for an edited collection (invitation only) being assembled under my direction,[...] If you are interested in participating, please [click your heels three times and say "there's no status like tenure."]

We also invite you to consider serving as the editor of a new collected work under your own auspices. [Ed: "Auspices?" I didn't even know I had them. Is there a cream of something I can take for that? -- drk.] or by proposing [anything that you think would be a publishable project up to and including a collection of artwork].

Something like that, anyway. The publisher is Nova Science Publishers, and the correspondant is the Editor-in-Chief, who seems to be involved in a hell of a lot of different fields. But in light of the recent revelations (q.v elsewhere) on the marvelous "peer-review" going on at Bentham of Dr. Jones' paper on the WTC collapse, I thought I would give it a cynical look-see.

The web doesn't say much, or else my Google-fu isn't up to the task. There are some very good scholars who seem to have published through Nova, but there are also some pretty damning criticisms about they way they run some of their journals. Some other potential downsides --- the field of the volume is peripherally related to what I do, but not central. The Email addresses are bla@aol.com and bla@earthlink.net, not bla@novapublishers.com (but that may just be to use AOL's spam filter), and the turnaround time is really tight for a collected volume (but that may again just be a tightly run ship). Finally, I'm not used to seeing small publishers that are willing to consider projects on that wide a range of topics and audiences. But again, low-overhead POD may simply make it worth their while to spend $250 on a project that will net them $500 in return.

So anyone out there know Da <3 of Da Matta?

 

[dudalb]

IF they ask you to fork over money for any reason, you are definently dealing with a vanity press.

 

[drkitten]

IF they ask you to fork over money for any reason, you are definently dealing with a vanity press.

Way ahead of you there, guy. They are not asking for money -- not even page charges.

 

[TruthSeeker]

I get similar emails fairly regularly. I usually ignore them.

I didn't realize you were on the tenure track. At my institution (and yours may be different), chapters are very low status, especially if they do not appear in a major publisher's volume. Better to spend that time on empirical papers in high impact journals.

 

[drkitten]

I get similar emails fairly regularly. I usually ignore them.

From that particular publisher? The only reason that I ask is because there are a couple of edited-collections that I have been thinking of trying to put together myself, and if this were a legitimate publisher that can keep to a tight publishing schedule, it's definitely one for the Rolodex. [As a counter-example, I just got a book back from John Benjamins with the chapter in it that I submitted in 2001(!); I couldn't do that to my authors.]

I didn't realize you were on the tenure track.

Oh, no. Long past tenure, which is why I can afford to branch out into peripheral fields and publish cool-sounding stuff to a much broader audience.

But thanks for the very good advice for anyone else reading who might be facing a tenure decision in the future.

 

[TruthSeeker]

I'm not sure if it's the same publisher. I'll see what I can recover from my deleted email.

I think if I were in your position, I would send proposals out to the best publishers in my field first to see if they are interested. In my experience, Elsevier is very good.

Sorry about the tenure confusion. I was fairly certain you are a more senior faculty member but it would not have been the first time I got confused.

 

[drkitten]

I think if I were in your position, I would send proposals out to the best publishers in my field first to see if they are interested. In my experience, Elsevier is very good.

I can also recommend Oxford, as long as we're swapping stories, as well as Prentice-Hall for more technical material.

But I've also had some very good experiences dealing with the smaller, newer, POD publishers. If nothing else, they're more willing to take chances on some of my more, ahem, out-of-the-box ideas. ("No, really! The world isn't round! It's shaped rather like a burrito!")

Sorry about the tenure confusion.

Oh, no, I'm flattered. Rather like walking into a bar and getting carded....

 

[TruthSeeker]

The only one I was able to recover arrived last week from "Research Signpost"
Some similar content but also major differences. Basically, they want a book on any aspect of my field by any authors at all. There is also an interesting twist around page charges (bolded below). I don't think Research Signpost would be a good choice

Research Signpost, leaders in scientific publishing with over 2000-strong titles of scientific distinction, compiled, organized, edited and written by eminent scientists from well known research institutions from round the world, intends to publish a review book in the subject area of XXX (any aspect)

As part of a drive to include and collaborate with eminent scientists and researchers, we invite you to edit a volume in this subject area for us, either alone or with colleagues of your choice as co-editors on a topic/theme of your choice.

The topic, authors and time-frame for the collection, correction, compilation and final submission of manuscripts to us may be decided by you. A very senior professor/researcher may be- IF YOU SO WISH –requested to guide you as the Editorial Consultant. This means that you will be Chief Editor and the guiding, editing and stewardship of the entire volume will be in your hands.
Guidelines are given below-------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. You and your team are free to select the TOPIC and contact different contributing scientists
-OR- if you provide us with a list of scientists and their addresses with e-mail IDs, we will mail to them invitations for contributions on your behalf.
2. They could be exclusively from your country or anywhere in the world.
3. The articles in the final form should be mailed to us.
4. There should be a minimum of 8 articles or 100 pages. There is no limit to the maximum number of articles or pages.
5. There has to be a time limit ie; the articles should be ready by say 8-10 months or a specific month/cut-off date YOU deem fit.
6. We will send you 8 free copies of the book.
7. We will mail books free of cost to 3 people or institutions of your choice at the addresses provided by you.
8. We will send to all major laboratories of the world, the name of the book, the editor, titles of articles with the authors & addresses through our formal individual Global Title Mailing Program.
9. The title of the book, the name of the Consultant Editor, names of Editors(s), and titles of articles with the names of authors and their affiliations will be hosted in our website-

10. There will be no page charges for the manuscripts to be published. But the economic viability in the initial stages will be maintained by the authors/author's institutions purchasing a minimum of 100 reprints of their articles. The authors will be benefited by:

Thanking you and awaiting your response
Sincerely yours,
Managing Editor

 

[drkitten]

bump.

 

[joobz]

hey, this is a great thread and would like to ask a related question:
What is your take on Slidesonline?

I received this email:

Subject:Your publication - [awesome recent publication]

Congratulation on your publication on [awesome recent publication]
We would like to invite you to submit a slide presentation of your publication on

www.slidesonline.org​

This is a digital library made for physicians worldwide to access slide presentation on most updated research and clinical disorders. Presentation from faculties from Mayo clinic, U Mass, Stanford, U Penn, U of Chicago and others can be reviewed on this website.As you know many students and physicians do not have access to this journal and would be deprived from these important findings. We would really appreciate if you would be willing to share a slide presentation with us on your publication.Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
....

It's no big deal for me to upload, but is it even worth it?
I am pretenure, so any advice is always welcome.

 

[Megalodon]

Sorry for the necromancy, but just got this email

Dear Dr. BigMeanExtinctFish,

We have learned of your published research on [my published research]. We would like to invite your participation in our publishing program. In particular, I have in mind a new research or review article for an edited collection (invitation only) being assembled under my direction tentatively entitled

"[Tentative title]"

So, any experiences with these guys? Drkitten, did you end up publishing with them?

 

[drkitten]

Sorry for the necromancy, but just got this email



So, any experiences with these guys? Drkitten, did you end up publishing with them?

I did not; even if it wasn't an outright scam, it seemed not worth the effort. I have "real" work to do, alas.

 

[ingoa]

Dr. Kitten,
I get the same stuff (with varying topics) twice a week. I rank it as spam.

Best wishes,
Ingoa

 

[Megalodon]

I did not; even if it wasn't an outright scam, it seemed not worth the effort. I have "real" work to do, alas.

Thanks. It looked the same to me, but since the 2nd or 3rd link in Google was this thread, I thought i might just ask