Authorship wars: academics outline the rules for recognition

I think it's rather simple. If more than six people were involved in the project then it has a single author "plus team of XX people", with all those people and their roles listed in an appendix to the paper, headed "Project Team". Think of this as an extension to the "et al" concept of referencing papers. Anyone who bases anything on authorship will now have to also look through the project team listing if the words "plus team" appear in the author list.

In open peer review and post publication peer review, academics who add meaningful comments or make corrections to published articles are authors and should be perceived as such.

In open peer review and post publication peer review, academics who add meaningful comments or make corrections to published articles are authors and should be perceived as such.

To be blunt, claiming (or accepting) authorship of a paper when you have not had significant input into the research or the writing is fraud.

This article seems very one-sided, and doesn't consider how senior scholars might not be recognized (although I agree that junior scholars are likely more vulnerable to being under-acknowledged). For instance, it doesn't discuss the considerable (unseen) labour that many senior researchers invest in revising manuscripts drafted by junior researchers (esp. those who have limited English skills, in the case where publications must be in English) and/or revising Honors and Masters theses for publication for students who have moved on (and the students still maintain principal-author credit, even if substantial reanalyses and/or revisions are required). I would argue that many senior scholars want to support their students' publications, but this kind of labour is often under-appreciated, and the manuscript would not be publishable without it. And no, I don't think this substantive work is just part of the job in educating students; there is difference between an academic exercise and professional writing. That last portion of writing a manuscript, bringing an okay manuscript to an excellent manuscript is gruelling, and something that often junior scholars are not skilled at.

Senior researchers who invest ideas, time in discussing, reviewing and even effort in editing the manuscript to make it publishable have to be duly acknowledged- but the first authorship goes to the one who worked on it