DOAJ delists about 3,300 journals for failing to reapply

The Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) announced that it has delisted about 3,300 titles in order to ensure that questionable and inactive publishers do not find their way into the directory.

The DOAJ, which contains more than 10000 open access journals, has been criticized for poor quality control. Therefore, in 2014, DOAJ’s managing director Lars Bjørnshauge had declared that all the journals listed in the directory will have to reapply to meet the newer and stricter selection criteria. The process was an attempt to detect the presence of any questionable journals. However, many journals failed to reapply despite having been sent multiple reminders. As a result, those journals have been struck off from the DOAJ.

According to Dominic Mitchell, community manager for the directory, many of the journals that did not reapply claimed to be based in the U.S. However, she suspects that they actually operate from other countries. Bjørnshauge stated that not all the journals that did not reapply are likely to be predatory; they could be “small outfits that are unfamiliar with providing the information required for reapplication.” He confirmed that 6,700 journals have reapplied and are likely to meet the required standards.

The DOAJ’s attempts at trying to keep journals with lower standards at bay are appreciated by many librarians and researchers. However, some others, such as Jeffrey Beall have raised concerns about the possibilities of the DOAJ’s ‘whitelist’ including weaker publishers as well since the directory relies on publisher-provided data.

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Open-access index delists thousands of journals