Funders mull robot reviewers for Research Excellence Framework

A ranking of the journals and then using that to predict the REF outcomes will work much better. Just agree the journal ranking and then award so much credit for each article in each journal. The problem with "reading" each article is that if the submission is from Oxford, Cambridge. Warwick, Imperial etc then it will get a 4* rating while for other "lesser" Universities it will be given a 3* ranking even if it is in the same journal. The REF has always favoured the already advantaged.

Funny time of year for an April fool. Has the prof not heard of the axiom that as soon as a characteristic is used as a performance indicator it becomes useless as a measure? And won't we have to retain a control sample for peer review, and have an appeals system, and invest in updates, and AI countermeasures, ad infinitum?