Procedure for Submitting, Reviewing, and Publishing Articles in the Journal of Systemic, Cybernetics, and Informatics: JSCI

Articles Published in Regular Issues since 2003

The Journal of Systemics, Informatics, and Cybernetics (JSCI) is an Open Access Journal with no subscription revenue. Printed copies have been delivered for free in the initial seven years of the journal.

All articles published, since 2003, in regular issues were presented at conferences organized by the International Institute of Informatics as Sytemics (IIIS, www.iiis.org) with no article processing charge for any of the authors.  Absolutely all articles published in the journal were selected by the respective conference audience as the best 20%-30% of all papers presented at the conferences, or according the quantitative evaluation of the respective reviewers.  This is equivalent to the 12%-18% of the articles submitted to these conferences.

This means that a third review, made by the conference audience, is added to the two-tier reviewing methodology of the IIIS conferences, before any article is published in the journal. 

But, an increasing number of authors have been asking us to also publish in the journal articles not necessarily presented previously at an IIIS conference. Planning to meet this requirement, we decided to initiate a second phase of the journal oriented to accepting submissions of papers not presented previously at an IIIS conference. Consequently, we decided to start a second phase of the journal oriented to receive, review and publish papers not previously presented at an IIIS conference.
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Direct Submission to the Journal

The procedure of directly submitting articles to regular issues of  the journal, has at least two steps, is as follows (special issues may have a different procedure and deadlines):

Step 1. The submission of an abstract (200-400 words) written for inter-disciplinary communication to JSCI at iiis.org for its internal review, i.e. academics from different disciplines should be able to understand the extended abstract, and 2) it should contain at least the following three parts:

• Objectives achieved and/or results attained.
• Means, methods, and/or methodologies used.
• Conclusions and/or possible next suggested steps.

Step 2. If your abstract is accepted then you will be asked to submit your draft paper (about 3000-5000 words). The reviewing methodology includes the mandatory two-tier methodology (double-blind and non-blind) that has been applied, since 2006, to the papers published in the journal (https://www.iiisci.org/Journal/SCI/Methodology.pdf),

The two-tier mandatory reviewing is necessary for the paper acceptance and possible improvement.

If the full paper is accepted in the second reviewing step (external review), then the extended abstract for inter-disciplinary communication might be used (by the author and/or by JSCI) in the academic social media (e.g. academia.edu, Research Gate, etc.) linking it to the published full paper and, consequently, increasing the visibility of the paper.
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The Commitment You Are Making when Submitting an Article

By submitting this kind of extended abstract the authors, or co-authors, would be agreeing on making the commitment of:

1. Submitting the full article draft according the respective deadline;
2. Not submitting the same article for its potential review and publication to another venue while it is being reviewed by JSCI according the respective deadline of “notification to authors”;
3. Not utilizing texts from other publications without making the respective references, and not using curves, diagrams, photos, tableaux, etc. without obtaining the respective permit, if they are copyrighted. By not meeting this commitment the JSCI will stop the reviewing process of the article and will free the author from his/her commitment and expected ethical behavior of not submitting the same article for its potential publication in other venues, while it is being reviewed by JSCI; and
4. Uploading the final version of the full paper, if it is accepted, in the second step of its reviewing process, described below. To do so, the author should make payment of the respective Article Processing Charge ($550), which is the minimum of the reported costs in the literature. This means that the Article Processing Charge (publication fee) will be the minimum of the reported Article Processing Cost. Some more details regarding this issue are presented below. More details are presented in the included links.

The Journal of Systemics, Informatics, and Cybernetics (JSCI) is an Open Access Journal with no subscription revenue. Printed copies have been delivered for free in the initial seven years of the journal.

All articles published, since 2003, in regular issues were presented at conferences organized by the International Institute of Informatics as Sytemics (IIIS, www.iiis.org) with no article processing charge for any of the authors.  Absolutely all articles published in the journal were selected by the respective conference audience as the best 20%-30% of all papers presented at the conferences, or according the quantitative evaluation of the respective reviewers.

This means that a third review, made by the conference audience, is added to the two-tier reviewing methodology of the IIIS conferences, before any article is published in the journal. 

But, an increasing number of authors have been asking us to also publish in the journal articles not necessarily presented previously at an IIIS conference. Planning to meet this requirement, we decided to initiate a second phase of the journal oriented to accepting submissions of papers not presented previously at an IIIS conference.

In order to stay autonomous from any external financial support, the operating and publishing costs of the Journal should be supported by the authors of its reviewed and accepted articles. The costs of subscriptions-based journals are paid by their readers or by their respective organizations. Open access journals are financially supported by their authors, or by their respective organizations.

Furthermore, we believe that immediate, barrier-free, worldwide open access to the full text of peer reviewed articles, published in the The Journal of Systemics, Informatics, and Cybernetics (JSCI), is in the best interests of the scientific, academic, and professional Communities.
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Article Processing Charge (APC)

The Article Processing Charge (APC) for regular issues of the journal is $ 550, i.e. about the 50% of the minimum reported by 2001, and about the 32% of minimum reported by 2005, according to reputable scholars, when referring to peer-reviewed journals of not-for-profit scholarly associations. This will be feasible thanks to the sponsorship of the International Institute of Informatics and Systemics.

More details regarding the costs and revenues of open access journals can be found in the article “Costs, Prices, and Revenues in Journal Publishing” posted at https://www.iiisci.org/journal/sci/Costs.pdf. Below, we will present a very brief summary of peer-reviewed journal’s APC associated with “for-profit” and “not-for-profit” organizations. The latters are basically scholarly associations.

There are surprising differences between the fees that authors, or their institutions, should pay for as Article Processing Charge (APC), which in Open Access journals vary from $500 to $ 3000 by 2006 (Waltham, Learned Society Business Models and Open Access, 2006, p. 128) 

Waltham (2006) (2005) based her detailed study on the publishing costs of 9 learned society publishers (13 journals).  One of Waltham’s most important conclusions was that “Although average numbers mask the quite profound differences in the journals analyzed, the average publishing cost per article in print and online was £1,447 (range £493-£2,232) and per page £144 (range £65 – £203) in 2004. The average revenue per article was £1,918 (range £389-£3,380) and per page was £194 (range £21-£538) in 2004.” (Waltham, 2005, p. 49). To calculate the on-line costs, Waltham (2005) removed the print costs (manufacturing and production, distribution and fulfillment). The results she obtained indicate that the minimum cost that she found per article was £ 404 and the minimum per page was £ 63. Notice that she is referring to the cost, not to the price or revenue. The range of the costs per article, in 2004, was £404 - £1580, with an average of £956.25. The complete table was reproduced in the article “Costs, Prices, and Revenues in Journal Publishing” posted at https://www.iiisci.org/journal/sci/Costs.pdf

In a larger study and meta-study, (Ginsparg P. , 2001), (Ginsparg P. , 2003), the founder of arXiv,  summarized his findings, as follows, in an invited contribution to the conference held at UNESCO HQ, Paris, 19-23 Feb 2001, on Electronic Publishing in Science,  providing as conclusions the following numbers in regard to the publishing fees (revenues).

• $10,000-$20,000 per article, as revenue of the “high-end” commercial publishers.
• $4000 per article as an aggregate average of the revenue of different kinds of publishers (based on a study made by Odlyzco regarding Mathematical and Computer Science journals).
• $1000-$2000 per article as revenue (or publication fees, of not-for-profit organizations or scholarly associations.
• $500-$1000 per article as revenue for electronic start-up publishers

The $4000 per article announced in 2001-2003 by Ginsberg, as an aggregate average of the revenue (publication fee) of different kinds of publishers, increases to $5000 per article according to a more recent and a much more comprehensive report.  Richard Van Noorden (Open access: The true cost of science publishing, 2013) affirms that:


Lilian Nassi-Calò (How much does it cost to publish in Open Access?, 2013) references as well this important article because of the comprehensiveness of its source, referring to almost all journals in the science-publishing industry and its overall 1.8 million English-language articles.

These numbers differ significantly from what Ginsparg expected. He asserted as a conclusion of his studies that:

Ginsparg made the conclusion that “costs on the order of some irreducible $1000 per peer-reviewed published article should be expected, using current methodology” (Ginsparg P. , 2001) for electronic publishing with no print product [Italics and emphasis added]

Ginsparg Shows the huge difference between price (publication fees) of the high-end” commercial publishers and publication costs, in order to show editorial, marketing, production and distribution costs involved in academic journal publication, and to support his reasoning regarding the potential of electronic publishing may significantly lower these costs and this is why his work was oriented to estimate the minimum cost of electronic publishing.

Consequently, Ginspargs affirm that electronic publishing real costs (with no print product) were in the range of $500-$1000 per article (for year 2001), where the more volunteer work is done, the closer the costs are to the lower part of the range, and the less volunteer work is done, the closer the costs are to the upper limit of the range. In any case, the peer-reviewing is supposed to be based on volunteers (references and more details can be found at www.iiisci.org/journal/sci/Costs.pdf)

Consequently, it is evident that the Article Processing Charge of JSCI is associated with the lowest cost at which a peer reviewed open access journal can process and publish its respective articles, with a significant volunteering work. This can be achieved because of 1) the volunteer work being done, 2) the financial support provided by the International Institute of Informatics and Systemics (IIIS), especially with regard to the 50% of discount provided to IIIS’s members, and 3) the editorial policy of asking authors to be responsible for the proofreading and language editing of their respective papers. Nonnative authors should have a native English co-author, or a native English reviewer of the language being used, which might be done by a colleague (who should be mentioned in the acknowledgements) or by a paying the cost of the respective proofreading services. JSCI may contract a professional proofreading and language editing in which case the respective author will have an additional charge.
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Acceptance Policy

Final acceptance depends on two kinds of reviews, but an article should be recommended by non-blind (i.e. non-anonymous) reviewers AND double-blind (anonymous) reviewers in order to be accepted for its publication. Recommendations of acceptance made by non-anonymous reviewers are necessary but not sufficient condition for paper’s final acceptance. A submitted paper, should also have a majority of its double-blind reviewers recommending its acceptance. If an article has been accepted by one of these two methods of reviewing but not by the other one, it would not be accepted unless it is modified according to the comments and to the requirements of those reviewers who recommended not accepting it as it is. Together, both of these conditions generate a more reliable and rigorous review than a reviewing processes based on just one of the indicated methods. More details for the supporting reasoning of this two-tier reviewing methodology can be found at https://www.iiisci.org/Journal/SCI/Methodology.pdf. This level of reliability and quality assurance is required for a journal that has been publishing the best 25%-30% of the articles presented at a conference.
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Special Issues

Special Issues of the Journal might have different reviewing methodologies and acceptance policies. Any difference regarding the information provided here for the regular issues of the journal will be announced in the respective call for papers. Otherwise, the information provided here will also be applicable.
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Self-Plagiarism

In the context of ethical and academic misconduct, deception or the intention to deceive are the defining characteristics of self-plagiarism, How and whom you deceive is what generate the variety of different kinds of self-plagiarism. In a legal context, it depends on the signed contract, but, in any case, it is always related to the text, the prose and not the ideas.

This is why reuse of one’s text or prose might be 1) legal but unethical, 2) illegal, but ethical (as for example in an unfair interpretation of the copyright agreement or attorney skills in interpreting the fair-use in a way that benefit the copyright holder), 3) illegal and unethical, and 4) legal and ethical.

Consequently Elise Langdon-Neuner  (Publication more than once: duplicate publication and reuse of text, retrieved, 2008), Editor-in-chief of The Write Stuff (The Journal of the European Medical Writers Association, made the following conclusions

All these conclusions and recommendations are in agreement with the characterization of self-plagiarism as related to an act or the intention of deceiving and agree with the Journal’s policy regarding to what should an author do in order to avoid the misconduct of self-plagiarism. Consequently, we subscribe the advices given, above, by Langdon-Neuner (Publication more than once: duplicate publication and reuse of text., 2008, p. 3). They are among the clearest we could find in the literature.

Authors of the papers published in this journal should make the commitment to follow this policy before submitting the initial and the final versions of their papers to the journal of Systemics, Cybernetics, and Informatics (JSCI).

More details regarding the notion of Self-plagiarism could be found at http://www.iiis.org/Nagib%2DCallaos/self%2Dplagiarism/
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International Ethical Standards

The Journal of Systemic, Cybernetics, and Informatics: JSCI follows the “International standards for editors and authors” developed by the  Committee of Publication Ethics (COPE) during  the 2nd World Conference on Research Integrity in Singapore in 2010. These ethical standards have been published as part of the conference proceedings under a Creative Commons license*. Wager E & Kleinert S (2011), Responsible research publication: international standards for authors. A position statement developed at the 2^nd World Conference on Research Integrity, Singapore, July 22-24, 2010. Chapter 50 in: Mayer T & Steneck N (eds) Promoting Research Integrity in a Global Environment. Imperial College Press / World Scientific Publishing, Singapore (pp 309-16). (ISBN 978-981-4340-97-7).