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<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">Dear colleagues,</span><br>
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<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">It has come to my attention that there is rapid increase in low quality and dubious submissions send to all journals. This is a global problem that needs a coordinated effort to help solve.</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">
</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">With the rapid increase in lot of low quality and dubious</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">
</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">submissions to all journals , it is important that all professional and scientific organisations are careful in this .</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"> </span></p>
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<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">My humble suggestion is that all</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"> GIS </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">professional organisations should avoid</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">
</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">taking any sponsorship or royalty for scholarly publications (books, journals etc) from any</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"> </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">GIS
vendors . If a professional association takes sponsorship for any scholarly publication (edited books etc)</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">
</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">from any GIS vendor and agrees to publish it through the vendor’s press then there is potential issues with independent peer review and ensuring scientific quality. It is only </span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">natural
that any GIS vendor publication press to have vested interests in promoting their products and agenda.</span></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"> </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">It also makes
it easy for the vendor to get endorsement for th</span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">eir </span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> products from scientific and professional </span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">organisations </span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">using
this route.</span></span></p>
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<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11pt;">By taking sponsorship for scholarly publications (edited books etc) from any vendors , it will then become difficult for the Professional Organisations to take strong moral</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11pt;">
</span><font face="Helvetica Neue"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">stand against low quality and dubious submissions for other journals .</span></font><font face="Helvetica Neue"><span style="font-size: 12px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Especially in times
we are seeing </span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">increase in fake scientific articles etc, it is important to</span></span></font><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 11pt;">
</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Helvetica Neue"; font-size: 12px;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">have clear guidelines for any sponsorship</span><span style="font-size: 11pt;">.</span></span></p>
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<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">I am happy to work on a Open Letter to highlight this issue but will need help from the wider community. If you are a journal editor, it will be very helpful, if you can share the statistics of how many</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">
</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">articles that you have identified in the last three years that are problem and you have rejected .It will be helpful to share examples of these (removing author details etc) , so the wider community
is aware of the problem and can take steps to help reduce the problem in the future.</span></p>
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<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">Best wishes,</span></p>
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<p><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;"></span></p>
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<span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 11pt;">Suchith</span></p>
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