MESSAGE FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
CHANGES
Members of the Cooper Ornithological Society and other regular readers of
The Condor will have noticed a few changes in 2009, the journal’s 111th year
of publication. Perhaps the single most substantive change has been
institution of the journal’s first editorial board. I invite you to peruse
the masthead and familiarize yourself with this august board. Its members do
more than act as “mere” associate editors, however. Rather, these dedicated
experts are “reviewing editors” who, whenever possible, prepare the reviews
themselves. All submissions continue to receive a minimum of two reviews,
but this process has cut the time to first decision substantially.
While at the masthead, note that the journal has a new editorial office
based at the University of Oklahoma as well as a new managing editor based
at the San Diego Natural History Museum. And, better late than never, the
journal has gone fully to an electronic submission and review system,
Manuscript Central. Between addition of the board of reviewing editors and
electronic submissions, the time from submission to print publication has
also been cut markedly. Furthermore, the University of California Press,
The
Condor’s new publisher, has an “ahead of print” system that ensures quick
dissemination of your research.
Yet these changes are only the ones made to date. Others are on their way,
in the near term the most notable of which is that beginning with volume
112, The Condor will no longer publish Short Communications. Dropping one of
the journal’s staples since its inception may seem odd, but competition for
journal space is higher than ever, and the Cooper Ornithological Society
has opted to dedicate The Condor’s limited space to feature articles. Short
papers that might otherwise have been treated as a Short Communication may
still be considered, but such papers will have to synthesize data across
species or systems or deal with a broad question. As of August 2008, short
papers on single aspect of a single species’ biology, however interesting,
will no longer be considered.
In the future, The Condor will also begin to feature Correspondence,
Perspectives or Commentaries, and review papers, including
“mini-reviews”—briefer summaries of hot topics and current trends in
ornithology. For each change made, I hope it is evident that our goal is to
create the most vital print medium possible for rapid communication of key
discoveries and important research in the field of avian biology.
SCIENTIFIC INTEGRITY
Perhaps it is a sign of these hyper-competitive times, or perhaps the
problem has always been here but in the past was rare enough to be dealt
with easily, or perhaps we are growing more aware of the issue. Regardless,
breaches of scientific integrity appear to be on the rise: plagiarism and
fakery grab headlines routinely. Whatever the benefit the perpetrator
perceives—be it fame or grant money or prestige—the chief cost appears to be
the continued chipping away at the public’s perception of science. In the
United States, for example, it may seem that the public disdain for
scientific data could not be eroded further, but I venture that with each
revealed episode of deceit and chicanery, the naysayers win more converts.
In this light, I would hope that it goes without saying that
The Condor will
not take matters of plagiarism or fakery lightly; indeed, it will not
tolerate them at all. We will uphold the highest scientific standards, and
we expect each of the journal’s authors and reviewers to comply.
Demonstrated failure to do so will result in the perpetrator’s being barred
from further submissions and having the offending papers pulled for on-line
archives.
