> ## Content Index
> Fetch the complete content index at: https://balaustine.mymagic.page/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further.

# The cycle
- URL: https://balaustine.mymagic.page/the-cycle/
- Published: 2019-11-06T23:16:00.000Z
- Updated: 2019-11-06T23:16:00.000Z
- Author: VM
- Tags: Science, for-profit publishing, impact factor, Nature journal, peer review, prestige bias, prestige journals, publish or perish, scientific publishing, #Migrated-1787483357778, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-08-23 11:09

Is it just me or does everyone see a self-fulfilling prophecy here?

https://twitter.com/nature/status/1192129029924634625

For a long time, and assisted ably by the ‘publish or perish’ paradigm, researchers sought to have their papers published in high-impact-factor journals – a.k.a. prestige journals – like *Nature*.

Such journals in turn, assisted ably by [parasitic strategies](https://www.molbiolcell.org/doi/pdf/10.1091/mbc.E19-03-0147?ref=balaustine.mymagic.page), made these papers highly visible to other researchers around the world and, by virtue of being high-IF journals, tainted the results in the papers with a measure of prestige, ergo importance.

Evaluations and awards committees in turn were highly aware of these papers over others and picked their authors for rewards over others, further amplifying their work, increasing the opportunity cost incurred by the researchers who lose out, and increasing the prestige attached to the high-IF journals.

Run this cycle a few million times and you end up with the impression that there’s something journals like *Nature* get right – when in fact it’s just mostly a bunch of business practices to ensure they remain profitable.