It’s not a secret that I support open access publishing. If I’ve met you before you’ve probably heard my opinions on this matter (if not, avail yourself here). A couple of weeks ago, the arXiv—mainstay of academic research in mathematics, physics, computer science, and more—ran a forum on accessibility in scientific writing. A key question: “if it’s not accessible, is it really open science?” Of course, a similar question could be asked from the perspective of the author instead of the reader. Since antiquity, publishing and disseminating one’s results has been the foundation of mathematics and the sciences. If academic publishing is not accessible to authors, is it really science at all?

A year ago I nearly guest-edited a special issue with the MDPI journal Symmetry. I assembled some facts and figures to share with them regarding their egregious article processing charges and now want to share them with you. Below I have included the email I sent the chief editor of Symmetry, lightly edited but more-or-less copied and pasted. For legal reasons, I probably ought to point out that these are factual statements of publicly available information and do not constitute a tort. Since MDPI is not the type to take bad press well, it really seems prudent to note that I am simply stating the facts of the matter, shameful though they may be.

This blog post is not meant to just be paragraphs and paragraphs of me whinging. Its intended purpose goes beyond a discussion of my personal experiences dealing with MDPI. Indeed, my issues with MPDI go beyond the numbers outlined below, but much has been written about this and I am not the first or only person to feel this way—so what shall I be doing about it? For one thing, I will not be submitting to MDPI journals, nor will I be editing and reviewing for them. I would encourage others to do the same. MDPI has some journals (namely, Entropy) which address an unmet niche in terms of longer-form or more interdisplinary publishing venues, and do so without sacrificing quality; we ought also to acknowledge that the pressure to take advantage of a fast publication is a symptom of deeper problems, not the problem itself. We certainly shouldn’t judge our colleagues or their papers in MDPI journals with any undue harshness.

Nonetheless—it is important to show that we will not be extorted. The truth is MDPI has taken us in; they’ve identified these unmet needs and treated them as business opportunities. What we can do is fill that vacuum ourselves. For instance, a blog post by Timothy Gowers (and a few more related posts listed under that one), which are all very similar to this one, preciptated his beginning a new journal (Advances in Combinatorics) from scratch which met that need for a different sort of venue in discrete maths. This has happened a number of other times in mathematics, notably at the illustrious journal Topology (now Journal of Topology; see here, here, and here) and a saga in the world of $K$-theory (see here and here). Just recently (another reason why this post was timely for me), the entire editorial board of the Elsevier-run journal NeuroImage resigned over untenably high APCs, and began a new journal called Imaging Neuroscience. Read more about it here, here, and here. (On 8 May 2023 this post was updated to reference a recent Guardian article about Imaging Neuroscience and academic publishing.)

The conclusion: direct action is always in style. What we really need, in all the sciences, is free publishing—and we won’t get it unless we build it ourselves.

In any case, you will not be surprised to hear that the response from the chief editor was more handwaving about the costs associated with publication, suggesting my email had fallen on completely ignorant ears. More’s the better—at least I was motivated to no longer waste any time with MDPI. The co-editors of the aforementioned special issue had their own part to play in supporting our moving from MDPI to a different journal (you know who you are, and I thank you). A propos of nothing, a couple of weeks ago, an intriguing special issue of the journal Royal Society Interface appeared online. My next post will be some brief remarks about it.

If you read this and you have a paper under review at MDPI, consider pulling it, or consider (armed with the following facts) asking for a fee waiver. Some of this data is bound to be out of date, given it’s a year old, but a brief look at their 2021 and 2022 annual reports reveal similar figures.

 

I. Four key details of the situation are as follows—

  • In 2020, MDPI published 167000 articles—most all of them from special issues like this one—and made between 190 and 230 million [1] in revenue from the APCs of these papers.

  • This APC has grown exponentially in the past few years, from 100s of dollars to 1000s of dollars.

  • This happens whilst other ‘diamond’ open access journals publish without cost to the author.

  • Proponents of MDPI claim it is more inclusive [2], relaxing things like word limits and editorial criteria.

II. Now, your 2020 annual report [3] states that

  • MDPI waived fees for approximately 30% of all content in 2020. This is consistent with the figure reported in the 2019 report (25-27%). This is 50100 articles, going by the above figure.

  • “For journals in fields with low levels of funding, where authors typically do not have funds available, APCs are typically waived” [emphasis mine]. Again, the same language is found in your 2019 report [4].

The situation seems quite simple to me—offering larger waivers more consistently is both necessary for the success of this issue, and is provided for by MDPI’s own public reporting. Given such an excess in cash flow, when overheads of other journals would suggest this is unnecessary, I see no reason why your profit margin would rest on the full APCs of a dozen or so papers. Since enough waivers are set aside to cover at least partial losses on 50100 articles, I have every confidence that you will be able to find the money if you look for it.

Recall that the study of symmetry takes place primarily in the field of pure mathematics and mathematical physics. These are amongst the worst funded fields in the natural sciences. The average individual NSERC grant in mathematical physics is in the 35000 to 45000 dollar range, usually over a number of years. Just recently, the average size of an NSF three year grant was 30000 USD [5]. Total NSF expenditure [6] on mathematics is a fraction (0.5-5%) [7] of that of other fields, and has been on the decline overall for decades [8]. The average per annum funding level for mathematicians in the US (external, non-institutional funds, e.g. NSF or DOD awards) is miniscule, often not even covering summer salaries. Based on II.2, I would expect all fees to be partially or fully waived automatically. Why is this not the case, if your annual reports are accurate? (As a registered joint-stock corporation in Basel [9], you are required to maintain reliable, consolidated reports under the Swiss code of obligations, including anything that could be construed as management information, or expected losses, especially in terms of voluntary retained earnings or deferred income; refer to [10], page 16; the articles cited therein, especially CO 958c, CO 959a(2), and CO 961c; as well as to [11], page 6.)

Many mathematicians, ostensibly the target audience of the journal, don’t have a few thousand spare pounds lying around, and it is simply unimaginable to ask someone to pay this quantity of money out of their own pockets. I presume this is exactly why the language found in the annual reports exists. On the contrary, despite both legal and practical (if not moral) obligations to do so, you balk at my request for an allotment of waivers for the invitees to this issue. So in reality, I’m inclined to think that the costs associated with publishing at MDPI make it far more exclusive than other journals. We are excluding talented young scientists because they are unable to pay to play. To be frank, I worry about our ability to solicit invitations at all if we can’t make further accommodations. It seems we are being condemned to failure before we’ve even begun.

On a personal note, as I said, I am a mathematician, where low-cost open access has been a standard forever. There is no universe in which I (or any other mathematician) would pay 1800 CHF, or even three-quarters of that, to publish a paper. I just want to emphasise that this is basically an insult. The bottom line is, if any author invited to contribute to this special issue requests a partial or full fee waiver on the grounds of financial hardship, I expect it to be granted.

[1] https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2020/08/10/guest-post-mdpis-remarkable-growth/
[2] https://paolocrosetto.wordpress.com/2021/04/12/is-mdpi-a-predatory-publisher/
[3] https://mdpi-res.com/data/2020_web.pdf
[4] https://mdpi-res.com/data/2019_web.pdf
[5] https://www.nature.com/articles/35039681
[6] https://www.nsf.gov/about/budget/fy2015/pdf/53_fy2015.pdf
[7] https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/3091/why-fund-research-in-pure-mathematics/3100#3100
[8] https://www.jstor.org/stable/24967635
[9] https://handelsregister.help.ch/aktiengesellschaft.cfm?nr=CH-270.3.014.334-3&name=MDPI-AG
[10] https://assets.kpmg/content/dam/kpmg/ch/pdf/explanation-of-the-most-important-provisions.pdf
[11] https://www.pwc.ch/en/publications/2016/pwc_the_new_swiss_financial_reporting_law_jan_2015_e.pdf