In article <9405237724.AA772406487 at clink.acad.com> kmetzner at ACAD.COM
(Metzner, Ken) writes:
[Quoting me, Marc Roussel]
>In chemistry, physics and
>mathematics, the best journals are generally those published by professional
>societies.
>> Concerning Marc Roussel's comment about the best journals, it might be
> interesting to discuss what are the criteria for goodness of a
> journal? How do they rank? Are the criteria and their rankings
> different for different communities of journal users? How do you apply
> the criteria to compare actual real journals?
When I wrote the above-quoted comment, I was thinking of the great
families of journals put out by the American Chemical Society, the
American Physical Society and the American Mathematical Society. I know
a little less about the AMS journals, but the ACS and APS journals cover
all the major subfields and are generally well-read and well-cited.
They are also generally editorially very responsive. There are certainly
individual journals published by corporations which I would rank equally
highly (and professional-society journals which I consider poor) but
considering each stable of products as a whole, I think the
professional-society journals are usually better, from all perspectives.
In short, I suppose that there are two principal evaluation
criteria, at least for me:
1. Editorial responsiveness: Refereeing process is generally
quick and inquiries are promptly addressed.
2. Is my audience likely to read my work there? If no one
reads a particular journal, I'm likely to avoid it.
Note that I write here of evaluation for the purpose of submission, not
for the purpose of reading or buying. Those are separate issues.
Sincerely,
Marc R. Roussel
mroussel at alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca
