Segall said most high profile journals had not seen a downturn in submissions from scientists and that even some of the leading scientists involved in the Public Library of Science continue to submit to for-profit journals or restricted access journals.
“People as readers can trust that they are seeing some of the best work in the world,” said Ellis Rubinstein, editor of the prestigious non-profit Science magazine, which has a year-long embargo on free access.
“We add value to what a scientist does and we put their work in context and give them bigger exposure,” he said.
Segall, speaking as a scientist, also said top journals were a key measure for university hirings.
“I’ve heard it said that if you want tenure, you’ve got to get an article in Science or get on the cover of Cell,” she said. “If you’re a top scientist, you can take the risk of publishing on BioMed Central, but you may hurt your staff.”
Kirschner said the decision to help doctoral students gain credibility in the field of scientific research has prevented BioMed Central from bringing top of the line content to the journal.
“Right now, we are publishing less exciting information,” Kirschner said. “The work isn’t bad, but it hasn’t come to any exciting conclusion.”
HMS Dean Martin refused to comment and would only say through his spokesperson John Lacey, “the project is just too embryonic to say anything about.”
And Hyman agreed that BioMed Central faces an uphill battle in establishing credibility.
“It is often far harder to alter deeply entrenched patterns of human behaviors than it is to make progress in the lab,” he said in an email.
Still, the efforts of the Public Library of Science and BioMed Central have raised awareness in the scientific publishing industry about the problems restricted access presents to scientists who lack the funds to have subscriptions to their journal, journals editors said.
Science now has a content-sharing agreement with every library in China, and Cell will release archives to any scientists who demonstrates need.
And BioMed Centrals founders insist the journal has a future because of its revolutionary approach to publishing, where scientists pay a nominal fee for their article to undergo review and the journal itself makes no profit from the publication of the article.
Traditional journals charge scientists large fees for article reviews and assume the copyright and royalties for any journal article.
“This is the correct business model and will be an outlet for people to publish once they catch on,” Varmus said.
—Staff writer Nicole B. Usher can be reached at usher@fas.harvard.edu.