A mega journal (also mega-journal and megajournal) is a peer-reviewed academic open access journal designed to be much larger than a traditional journal by exerting low selectivity among accepted articles. It was pioneered by PLOS ONE. This highly lucrative publishing model was soon emulated by other publishers.
Contents
Definition
A mega journal has the following defining characteristics:
Other less universal characteristics are
Mega journals are also online-only, with no printed version, and are fully open access, in contrast to hybrid open access journals. Some "predatory" open access publishers use the mega journal model.
Influence
It has been suggested that the academic journal landscape might become dominated by a few mega journals in the future, at least in terms of total number of articles published. Megajournals are also disrupting the market of article processing charges. Their business model may not motivate reviewers, who donate their time to "influence their field, gain exposure to the most current cutting edge research or list their service to a prestigious journal on their CVs." Finally, they may no longer serve as "fora for the exchange ... among colleagues in a particular field or sub-field", as traditionally happened in scholarly journals. To counter that indiscrimination, PLOS ONE, the prototypical megajournal, has started to "package relevant articles into subject-specific collections."