SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
A list of low-quality science journals has been taken down without an apparent explanation:
A popular blog that lists "potential, possible, or probable predatory" publishers and journals has disappeared, but it is not clear why. The blog—started in 2010 by librarian Jeffrey Beall of the University of Colorado in Denver (CU Denver)—now states: "This service is no longer is available." Beall declined to comment. But a CU Denver spokesperson told ScienceInsider that Beall made a "personal decision" to take down his list of low-quality journals that charge authors a fee to publish, often with little or no review or editing. The spokesperson says the blog was not hacked, nor was it taken down as a result of legal threats, and Beall will remain on the school's faculty. The spokesperson could not confirm whether the blog's removal is permanent.
[...] Some are circulating a cached version of Beall's list on Twitter. Others speculated on social media that the shutdown may have something to do with the transfer of its lists to the company Cabell's International in Beaumont, Texas. But the firm has publicly said it is in "no way involved" with the blog's closure. Nevertheless, Cabell's noted that it has been developing its own blacklist, working with Beall as a consultant, since 2015, and plans to launch it later this year.
An executive at Cabell's later said that Beall shut down the blog due to "threats and politics". Here's some more analysis of the predatory publisher problem.
(Score: 3, Informative) by butthurt on Monday January 23 2017, @05:41AM
The New York Times agrees with you:
If Mr. Trump were to seek to change the libel laws, he would have to get the Supreme Court to overturn the ruling in Times v. Sullivan and subsequent cases built on it, or at least chip away at either the definition of “actual malice” or the characterization of a public official or public figure, said Sandra S. Baron, a senior fellow at Yale Law School’s Information Society Project and former executive director of the Media Law Resource Center.
-- https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/14/business/media/can-libel-laws-be-changed-under-trump.html [nytimes.com]
Well, they would, wouldn't they?
(Score: 2) by migz on Monday January 23 2017, @07:48PM
Nonesense. All that the government needs to change libel law, is to pass a new one.
BTW what's the Trump equivalent of Godwining?
(Score: 3, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Tuesday January 24 2017, @08:28PM
Nonesense. All that the government needs to change libel law, is to pass a new one.
Which will then be summarily overturned by the courts on the precedent cited above. Also, by your logic that we should treat the branches of government separately (despite the fact that the Judiciary would "win" in this case), Trump still can't do anything directly, since he leads the Executive Branch, not the Legislative.
Oh, and even if Trump could pursue legislation indirectly, there are NO federal libel laws, per se. Libel is handled at the state level. So unless Trump has control over state legislatures, I'm still not sure what he's going to do here.
Again -- if Trump wants to do this at the federal level, his only two realistic options are appoint justices to SCOTUS who will overturn precedent or pass a Constitutional amendment. (And neither of these is particularly realistic.)
(Score: 2) by migz on Wednesday January 25 2017, @06:59AM
The GP implied, and you have claimed that the precedent cannot be changed, that is not the case.
The judicial branch does not write law, they interpret the law. Since there are no federal libel laws, they have built up a body of law based on state and traditional law, this does not preclude the law being changed (not by the judiciary).
On what basis do you believe that the Federal government does not have standing to pass libel laws?
Further though your presupposition that such laws would prima faci be struck by the supreme court, lacks substantiation.
And in conclusion you concede that a constitutional amendment (a law passed by the Legislative branch) would "trump" the precedent, and change libel law.