Controversies
The concept of published articles is itself giving rise to controversy, especially as many journals refuse to publish colour plates for example, and if they do, they insist that authors pay the publisher. The problem arises because of the antiquated printing equipment still widely used by many publishers, and by the need for higher quality paper. In popular magazines, colour is the norm rather than the exception, as it is in computer text and articles. This is a great hindrance in many areas of research because colour photographs for example, usually provide much more information than black and white photographs. Often colour pictures are the only form which can be used to illustrate a point, such as blood smears in a forensic science article.
Other areas of controversy include the transfer of copyright from author to publisher, because many authors want to propagate their ideas more widely and re-use their material elsewhere without the need for permission. Usually an author or authors circumvent that problem by rewriting an article and using other pictures. Some publishers may also want publicity for their journal so will approve facsimile reproduction unconditionally; other publishers are more resistant.
Read more about this topic: Scientific Literature