Impact Factor, Pay-to-publish, IF=0

[sat0ri]

I have the possibility to publish some chemistry work as first author, but the journal has an impact factor of 0 according to my PI (but online I don't see anything published on the IF; the point is the IF dismal).

It is a pay to publish type journal, usually a short page or two, that can be on any novel synthetic compound or natural product. The journal is legitimate, but it is just a very lowly paper.

The question is, should I? For some reason, I'm almost afraid it will reflect poorly, showing desperation. I should have a few mid-author publications by the time of application. People always rave about first author papers, but I'm not sure if this would be that great. I'm not sure how many adcoms will be familiar with synthetic chemistry journals to know.

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[ridethecliche]

Not worth it. Pay to publish is a scam.

What about PlosOne or whatnot?

 

[Narmerguy]

If you think the work will be published at a later date in a better journal, don't do it. Having any pubs is great at this stage, the marginal benefit of being first author vs being middle author for a premed is exceedingly small. Most people will not have published and can still stand out for having a terrific research record (strong LOR from their PI, poster or oral presentations at conferences, honor's thesis, etc). These pay to publish journals are not good and while I can't say that you should avoid them (I would), I will say that you won't benefit much from it.

 

[sat0ri]

Not worth it. Pay to publish is a scam.

What about PlosOne or whatnot?

Well just for the field of synthetic chemistry, the impact factors are typically pretty low. So an IF of above 3 is generally pretty acceptable/respectable for most publications. With that, it means there's not much lower to go.

Everything is going to get published in the highest possible journal that fits the work. Basically, we can isolate an intermediate in the synthesis and since it is novel and doesn't really belong in a full-length article, we could publish in this journal on top of everything else. It's more of an extra, on top of everything else, option--making it more appealing. (And I'm doing a senior thesis so all the work would be done for it as well).

But I'm getting that it is just not worth it.

 

[ridethecliche]

Pay to publish journals have been known to accept hogwash articles.

http://www.nature.com/news/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gibberish-papers-1.14763

http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2009/06/10/nonsense-for-dollars/

If you want to be in that company, then go for it.

 

[sat0ri]

Pay to publish journals have been known to accept hogwash articles.

http://www.nature.com/news/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gibberish-papers-1.14763

http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2009/06/10/nonsense-for-dollars/

If you want to be in that company, then go for it.

Thank you for the sources. This is sort of what I was worried about, that it might actually neutral to negative affect. Given that it cost money, it's even more of a deterrent. I guess I was caught in a pre-med daze of first authorship daydreaming