Open Access

The term predatory journal refers to journals that are profit driven and do not intend to further the production of scholarship. Often the publishing entity will request money in exchange for the author to publish with them. In the world of publishing and open access publishing it is not uncommon, or unheard of for a publisher to make publishing a "pay to publish" opportunity. However, the intention of predatory journals is to gain funds from an author, without furthering scholarship or actually producing journals.

Some of the indicators that you might be dealing with a predatory journal include:

• The journal is very new, and is not endorsed by other standards in the field (new journals are not always bad, but be wary if they're unaffiliated)
• There is no information about the editorial board, or lists a single person
• The journal is charging a fee to publish with them (only "about 30% of OA journals charge author-side fees")
• The publication is bordering spamming with their solicitations for a submission
• The journal scope is very vague or absent entirely
• The journal title is very similar to a different seminal journal in the field (sometimes predatory journals will use titles that are the same or very close to journal standards in the field to make people believe that they are that journal, double check these titles)

Think.Check.Submit is an initiative to help researchers evaluate journals before submission, and identify when journals may be predatory.