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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

We want to get authors, research groups, reviewers, and institutions involved, and to support this. They may have doubts, which we try to anticipate and answer throughout this section.
You can now ask questions of this GitBook using a 'chatbot': click the search bar and choose 'lens'.

General FAQs

What is the Unjournal? (see here)

We will organize and fund public journal-independent feedback, rating, and evaluation of hosted papers and dynamically-presented research projects. We will focus on work that is highly relevant to global priorities (especially in economics, social science, and impact evaluation). We will encourage better research by making it easier for researchers to get feedback and credible ratings on their work.

Does the Unjournal charge fees to anyone?

No. The Unjournal does not charge any fees. In fact, we compensate evaluators for their time, and award prizes for strong work (in contrast to most traditional journals).
We are a nonprofit organization (hosted by OCF). We do not charge fees for access, and work to make it as open as possible. At some point in the future we might consider sliding-scale fees for people submitting their work for Unjournal evaluation, or for other services. If we do this, it would simply be as a way to cover the compensation we pay evaluators, and to cover our costs. Again, we are a nonprofit and we will stay that way.

Is the Unjournal a journal?

No, we will not ‘publish’ any research; we will just commission public evaluation and rating of relevant research. Having your work evaluated in the Unjournal should not limit you from submitting it to any publication.

Where does the Unjournal's funding come from, and how will it be sustainable?

At the moment, we have grants from philanthropists and organizations who are particularly interested in the credibility of the research areas we are prioritizing. Ideally, I hope that the research and the evaluation output will provide high enough value to justify further direct funding. We might also aim for funding from governments and universities supporting the open-access agenda. I am not sure whether we would want or need to tie this to any bespoke services we would provide to these entities; I'm very concerned about conflicts of interest. We might also look into other options to help sustain our processes, such as sliding-scale submission fees to cover the cost of paying evaluators.

Public-facing FAQ (also embedded below)

This Google Doc offers a space for you to publicly ask us any questions or comments you may have about the project. We can then publicly respond to these below as well.

Specific FAQs

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