A preliminary version of the GOA9 dataset is now available at at https://waltcrawford.name/g9_prefig.xlsx. I believe this dataset will be identical to the final g9 dataset on Figshare, unless some surprises turn up during preparation of derivative data and the book. The dataset proper includes 19,392 journals; the exclusions page has another 877 (including the “xd” journals). For more notes, see https://walt.lishost.org/2024/04/goa9-end-of-data-gathering/ [Note: crosschecking to prepare derivative data showed two keyboarding errors; they have been corrected and the preliminary dataset has been ..read more

I’ve finished the smallest but most annoying (and slowest) part of data gathering: rechecking the xm2/xx2 journals. It wasn’t entirely worthless–53 were now a (normal), five were now inactive (bi), one was now xj (no longer in DOAJ), and one was now dead/defunct (xd). Unfortunately, the malware problem is much worse than last year: 335 xm2 (compared to 260 last year) and, sigh, 313 xm (compared to 190 last year. It’s mostly Indonesia: almost precisely 2/3 of all malware cases (439 out of 648), including 157 of 313 new cases and 282 of 335 continuing (xm2). Next highest is Brazil with 42 new an ..read more

I’ve completed Pass 2, problematic journals and those where it seemed plausible that a new 2023 issue might emerge. Along the way, I also retested 35 of the xm2/xx2 journals, and–to my surprise–found five that could be resurrected looking for other URLs. So, given that there are only 456 of these, I’ll check them one more time. At this point–omitting those 456–there are 19,563 included journals and 250 excluded journals. The 250 exclusions account for only 438 articles in 2023, which is hardly surprising (the total peaked at 8,511 in 2020). Nearly all of the exclusions so far, 239 of them, are ..read more

Here’s the question: Should I post a preliminary dataset for GOA9 when I finish the final data-gathering pass, rather than waiting until the book is ready (my usual practice)? I’ll finish Pass 2 (rechecking most problematic cases that weren’t also problematic last year) this weekend. I’ve looked at enough of the “xm2/xx2” cases (ones that were problematic this year and last) to believe that it may be worth the few days required to recheck those. So the data will be ready some time next week–probably May 2-4. At that point, after a day off, I do some normalization, then start adding derivative ..read more

I’ve now done several cleanup things: Checked to see whether any of the journals removed from DOAJ since 1/1/2024 had been restored by 4/12/2024, None had; those journals are all treated as excluded. Compared codes for last year’s study with those this time around. If a journal is “xm” or “xx” and was also “xm” or “xx” last year, I stop checking it. There were a lot of these–adding those to the “xj” (removed) journals yields 948 journals that I marked as excluded and won’t recheck. Perhaps worth noting that those 948 only account for 9,757 articles in 2024 (where articles could be counted thr ..read more

In all, 20,269 journals have been checked, with (so far) a total of 1,425,237 articles in 2023 and 1,453,420 in 2022.  Just barely more than two-thirds of the journals are diamond (no fee): 13,596, as compared to 6.673 with fees. The second pass will involve 3,073 journals, including most of those noted below (except bi and xd) and another 1,200 or so that seem likely to have published another 2023 issue since they were checked. Special cases bi [Inactive: no articles since 2021]: 494. xd [Dead: no articles since 2018]: 224 xj {Removed from DOAJ since 1/1/24]: 119 xm [Malware and certifi ..read more

So far, 19,775 journals scanned (519 remain), with 1,396,763 articles in 2023, 1,425,512 in 2022. Of these journals, 6,545 have fees; 13,230 do not (diamond or platinum OA). Some 3,021 will be rechecked, including all of those below (except possibly xj) and others where it seems likely that 2023 issues have appeared since the first scan. Barring big issues, this scan will be done this week, followed by some massaging and two or three weeks for the rescan. Special cases bi [Inactive: no articles since 2021]: 481 xd [Defunct: no articles since 2018]: 215 xj [No longer in DOAJ]: 114 xm [Malware ..read more

Journals scanned so far: 18,400. Articles: 1,317,670 for 2023, 1,348,422 for 2022. 6 065 have fees of some sort; 12,335 do not (diamond OA). I’ll have to look at 2,868 again, including all of the ones below. Special Cases bi [Inactive: no articles since 2021]: 449 xd [Defunct, no articles since 2018]: 205 xj: [Apparently removed from DOAJ since 1/1/2024]: 97 xm [Malware and certificate problems]: 836 xn [Not an OA journal, including ones that now require login]: 19 xx [Unavailable or unworkable]: 818 The scan will not be finished next week, but, barring unforeseen problems with real life, it ..read more

MODIFIED LATER ON 3/24: It would appear that a whole bunch of “refusals” from one Indonesian university were a temporary outage–so I’m resaving this with modified, and better, numbers MODIFIED 3/31: This was, of course, week twelve, not week thirteen. ————————- 17,000 journals scanned, with 1,285,602 2023 articles and 1,315,137 2022 articles. While 5,619 journals have fees, 11,381 are diamond: no fees. Some 2,556 will need to be rechecked. A tough week in some ways, as you may see if you compare special case numbers with the previous week (which I am deliberately not going to do!) Special case ..read more

MODIFIED LATER ON 3/24: It would appear that a whole bunch of “refusals” from one Indonesian university were a temporary outage–so I’m resaving this with modified, and better, numbers 17,000 journals scanned, with 1,285,602 2023 articles and 1,315,137 2022 articles. While 5,619 journals have fees, 11,381 are diamond: no fees. Some 2,556 will need to be rechecked. A tough week in some ways, as you may see if you compare special case numbers with the previous week (which I am deliberately not going to do!) Special cases bi [no articles since 2021]: 424 xd [no articles since 2018]: 191 xj [appar ..read more