Massachusetts-based Aries Systems licenses a product called Editorial Manager to scholarly publishers. This is an online product that helps manage article submission and peer review for journals. Regrettably, one of Aries Systems’ clients is a notorious publisher that victimizes scholarly authors.
Aries Systems licenses Editorial Manager to OMICS Group, one of the most notorious and predatory open-access publishers of all time.
Flush with ill-gotten income, OMICS licenses and flaunts the software to make itself look like a legitimate publisher. Many respected journals and publishers license this product. I believe OMICS is unwarrantedly “buying” respect by licensing this product.
Last October, I sent a message to Aries Systems, registering my objection to their doing business with such a malevolent publisher.
I got a clever reply from the firm’s marketing manager, Alison E. O’Connell. She said, in part,
First, please know that we fully understand your concerns. We, ourselves, have thought long and hard about these issues.
Ultimately, we conclude that it would not be appropriate for Aries to stand in judgment of publishers or the merits of their content. Marketplace feedback and monitoring services are effective tools for identifying rogue publishers.
I think this is nonsense and she’s dissembling. In my original email, I didn’t say anything about OMICS Group’s “content.” I mentioned how they rip off and victimize innocent researchers. O’Connell cleverly turned the conversation from one about researcher victimization into one about freedom of the press.
Not a week goes by that I don’t receive an email from a researcher who was victimized by OMICS Group through one of the hundreds of journals it publishes under its many imprints.
OMICS group spams researchers, quickly accepting and publishing the article submissions it receives, then billing the author unexpectedly for thousands of dollars. The publisher does not honor withdrawal requests and instead uses pressure tactics to get authors to pay its excessive author fees.
By licensing its journal management software to OMICS Group, Aries Systems may be playing the role of enabler as OMICS continues to victimize honest researchers.
